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SERMONS BY

JOSEPH C. PHILPOT
(1802 – 1869)

Volume 1
 SERMON INDEX – Volume 1

Abiding in Christ John 15:4 JCP135

Abiding Comforter, The John 14:16, 17 JCP242
Abounding of Love in Knowledge
and Experience, The Philippians 1:9, 10, 11 JCP171
Acceptable Present to the Lord of Hosts, An Isaiah 18:7 JCP252
Acceptable Present to the Lord of Hosts, An Isaiah 18:7 JCP253
Accuser of the Brethren Cast Down
and Overcome, The Revelation 12:10, 11 JCP158
Accuser of the Brethren Overcome
and Cast Down, The Revelation 12:10, 11 JCP301
Afflicted Remnant and Their Confiding Trust, The Zeph. 3:12 JCP302
Alienation and Reconciliation Colossians 1:21-23 JCP026
Anchor within the Veil, The Hebrews 6:18, 19, 20 JCP115
Anointing which Teacheth of All Things, The 1 John 2:27 JCP168
Anxious Inquiry and a Gracious Answer, An Song of Solomon. 1:7, 8 JCP031
Appeal and Prayer of a Waiting Soul, The Psalm 39:7, 8 JCP226
Ascending Scale, or Steps of Thankful Praise, An Psalm 103: 3, 4 JCP183
Balm in Gilead Jeremiah 8:22 JCP256
Battle is the Lord's, The 2 Chronicles 20:12 JCP203
Believer's Colloquy with His Soul, A Psalm 42:11 JCP249
Believer's Gain His Loss, and the Believer's Loss
His Gain, The Philippians 3:7-9 JCP303
Better Things which Accompany Salvation, The Hebrews 6:9 JCP304
Bitter Waters Sweetened, The Exodus 15:23-25 JCP305
Benefits and Blessings of Union with Christ, The 1 Cor. 1:30, 31 JCP032
Blessedness of Divine Chastening, The Psalm 94:12, 13 JCP306
Blessedness of the Man Whom the Lord Hath
Chosen, The Psalm 65:4 JCP082
Blessedness of Trusting in the Lord, The Jeremiah 17:7, 8 JCP081
Blessings Imputed, and Mercies Imparted 1 Cor. 1:30, 31 JCP257
Blowing of the Gospel Trumpet, The Isaiah 27:12 JCP307
Blowing of the Great Trumpet, The Isaiah 27:13 JCP308
Bold Challenge, but a Complete Answer, A Romans 8:33, 34 JCP054
Branch of the Lord Beautiful and Glorious to
them that are Escaped of Israel, The Isaiah 4:2, 3 JCP074
Breaker, The Micah 2:3 JCP309
Breastplate and Helmet of the
Christian Warrior, The 1 Thess. 5:8, 9, 10 JCP068
Bruised Reed and Smoking Flax, The Matthew 12:20 JCP310
Called Unto Divine Fellowship 1 Cor. 1:9 JCP424
Channel of Gospel Blessings, The Romans 11:7 JCP311
Abiding in Christ

Preached at Providence Chapel, Eden Street, London, on Tuesday

Evening, July 6, 1847

"Abide in me, and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit of

itself, except it abide in the vine; no more can ye, except ye
abide in me." John 15:4

Have you ever considered the experience of the disciples when

their Lord and Master was sojourning here below? To my mind,
there is something very instructive, and, I may add, very
encouraging in it.

On the one hand, observe how ignorant they were of the nature
of Christ's kingdom! Two of the most eminent of them besought
him that they might sit, the one on his right hand, and the other
on his left, in his glory. What ignorance did that request imply of
the nature of his spiritual kingdom, as if there were a right and a
left hand there! Observe, too, their unbelief. How continually the
Lord had to chide them! "Where is your faith?" and "O ye of little
faith!" Remark also, their carnality and worldly-mindedness. How,
on one occasion, two of them asked their Master that fire might
come down from heaven to destroy his enemies! and how, at the
very first onset of danger, "they all forsook him and fled!" It is, to
my mind, very instructive and encouraging, thus to see their
weakness, ignorance, and unbelief.

We have taken a hasty glance at the dark side of the question;

we have traced out what they were in self. Let us now take
another view of their character, and mark something of the
Spirit's work upon their heart. For though they were, as I have
shown, ignorant, unbelieving, weak, and worldly-minded; yet
there were distinct marks of the Spirit's teaching in them.
Observe, for instance, their faith. What said Peter, who spake in
the name of them all? "We believe and are sure that thou art the
Christ, the Son of the living God." (John 6:69.) Observe, too,
their love. On one occasion, Thomas, the most unbelieving of
them all, felt such love springing up in his soul towards the
Redeemer that he said to his fellow-disciples, "Let us also go
(with him into Judea) that we may die with him." (John 11:16.)
Observe also, their sincerity. How they cleaved to the Lord
through evil report and good report! turned their back upon the
world, gave up everything that nature loves, and followed Jesus
in the strait and narrow path that leads to eternal life! Observe
also, their patience; as the Lord said to them, "Ye are they which
have continued with me in my temptations." (Luke 22:28.)

I bring forward these two sides, because there are many of the
Lord's family who are now precisely in the same state and stage
of experience that the disciples were when Christ was upon earth.
It is therefore most encouraging for them to see that they may
have all the short-comings, infirmities, and weakness that the
disciples had, and yet be true hearted and genuine followers of
the Lamb.

Observe too, how the Lord dealt with them as a nursing father. It
is true, there were occasions when he chid them! but how
tenderly he chid them! how he led them on step by step from
grace to grace! and how from time to time he opened up to them
the treasures of his loving heart! On that night, that gloomy
night, especially when the Lord was betrayed into the hands of
sinful men, he spake to them all that was in his heart. He had
hitherto called them "servants;" he would discard that title, and
would for the future call them "friends;" and as his friends he
would open up to them the secrets of his loving bosom.

In the chapter before us, he speaks of himself as the only Head of

divine influence: "I am the true Vine." He tells them too, what
they were in him, as well as what he was to them. "I am the
Vine, and ye are the branches." And the same truth he declares
in the words of the text, "Abide in me, and I in you. As the
branch cannot bear fruit of itself, except it abide in the vine; no
more can ye, except ye abide in me."
We may observe two things in the words before us. First, the
exhortation that the Lord gives them, "Abide in me, and I in you."
And secondly, the reason which the Lord lays before them that
they should abide in him; for that only by doing so could they
bear fruit to his glory.

I.—But before it can be said to any one, "Abide in Christ," he

must have standing in Christ. The very expression, "Abide in me,"
necessarily implies a union with Jesus. Now, of this union with
Christ, we may observe three distinct features. There is, first, the
eternal union which the church had with Christ before all worlds.
There is, secondly, the vital union which takes place betwixt
Christ and the believing soul, when the Holy Ghost raises up faith
in the heart. And there is, thirdly, communion with the Lord Jesus
Christ springing out of this vital union.

This is God's order, the order in which it lay in his eternal mind.
But it is not so with respect to the way whereby we become
acquainted with it. We do not see, first, our eternal union with
Christ, next proceed to vital union by living faith, and end all with
divine communion. But the way by which we are brought to
receive these things is, first, to feel ourselves "without Christ,"
cut off by sin from all communion with him; next, by a work of
grace upon the soul, to be brought to believe in his name, and
thus receive a vital union with him; out of this vital union with
him springs next living communion; and out of living communion
arises last a knowledge of eternal union.

But it will be desirable to enter into these things a little more in

detail. They are vital points of the deepest importance, therefore
not to be hurried over, nor passed lightly by; for on them
depends our eternal standing, as well as our evidence whether we
be bound for heaven or hell.

What, then, is the Scriptural description? (for by the Scriptures

we must always stand or fall)—what is the divinely inspired
account of the state of a child of God before he is brought to
believe in the Lord Jesus Christ? "Dead in trespasses and sins."
"Without Christ, being aliens from the commonwealth of Israel,
and strangers from the covenants of promise, having no hope,
and without God in the world." (Eph. 2:1, 12.) If this be the
description which the Holy Ghost has given of the elect in a state
of nature, (and the experience of every one divinely taught bears
testimony that God the Holy Ghost, in thus describing their
character, has penned it as with a ray of light), must not some
mighty revolution take place in the soul before it is brought to
believe in Christ, and thus to enjoy vital union with him? What
are we by nature? Are we not closely riveted and glued to the
world, to the things of time and sense, to our own righteousness,
and to all that God hates with perfect hatred? Must there not,
then, be a divorce from these first husbands, that we may be
married to another, even to him who is raised from the dead, that
we may bring forth fruit unto God? Must not the sharp sword of
God's word cut asunder this close union with the world, with the
things of time and sense, with our own righteousness, and with
the law? Surely. Before we can be brought into a knowledge of,
and any vital union with Christ, or any spiritual communion with
his most gracious Majesty, the keen knife must pass between us
and self, us and the law, us and our own righteousness, us and
our own fleshly obedience; and thus separate us utterly from
these things, in order to bring about a union to Christ, which we
never can have so long as we cleave to those perishing things on
which the eternal wrath of God rests. And is not this a painful
operation? Can the keen knife pass between us and the world, us
and our fleshly obedience, us and our own righteousness, us and
that idol self which we so dearly love and pay such devout
worship to, without leaving marks and scars upon our flesh, or
without causing some keen and acute sensations? It cannot; and
those who have experienced these things know it cannot. But
how indispensable, how utterly indispensable, is this operation in
the hands of the Spirit, to cut us off from self; that we may have
union, living union, with the Lord Jesus Christ. For Christ and self
can never unite. Christ's righteousness and our own
righteousness; the love of God and the love of the world; the
worshipping of Jesus, and the worshipping of idols; admiring of
ourselves, and admiring of him; can never sit upon the same
throne. Self must be laid in ruins before Jesus can be set up
effectually in the heart. There must be a divorce, a thorough
divorce, from everything that nature cleaves to, before a living
union with the Lord Jesus Christ can be brought about. This is the
reason why the Lord's people pass through such severe exercises,
perplexities, conflicts, and trials, such powerful temptations, such
varied feelings, such deep afflictions, to uproot them, to cut them
clean off and clean out of self, that they may be brought by
divine faith to have a vital union with the Lord Jesus Christ.

But is this sufficient? Something more is wanting. All our

exercises, all our convictions, all our afflictions; all our trials, all
our temptations—be they increased a thousand fold—cannot give
us a living union with Christ. We find this daily manifested. We
see many groaning and grieving under trials and afflictions, who
yet seem to have no vital union with the Lamb of God. Another
process is therefore necessary. The blessed Spirit must not only
cut us off from self, but give us a living union with the Lord Jesus
Christ. And how does he do this? By making him known to our
souls; by unfolding to us something of his glory. Was not this the
way by which the disciples had a living union with Christ? It was
not Peter leaving his fishing-nets that gave him a vital union with
Christ; it was not their coming out of the world that gave them a
vital union with Christ; it was not their preaching the gospel, nor
working miracles, that gave them a vital union with Christ. Did
not Judas do all these things as well as the rest? But it was what
the Apostle speaks of (John 1:14), "We beheld his glory, the glory
as of the only begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth." It
was this which gave them vital union with Christ. If we have
never, by the eye of faith, seen Jesus, the Son of God, "and
beheld his glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the Father,"
and felt the actings of living faith in our bosom whereby that
blessed Redeemer was laid hold of and embraced—whatever we
may talk about our religion, however highly we may estimate it,
or however highly other persons may esteem it in us, we have as
yet no vital proof of union with Jesus.

Let these two things, then, be well weighed up in your

experience. May Satan not deceive us in this matter. Two
processes are indispensably necessary to be passed through; the
one, a separation from self, produced by the keen edge of God's
word in the conscience; the other, a vital union with Jesus
through the actings of that living faith which the Holy Ghost alone
can raise up in the soul.

Now, out of this vital union with Christ springs communion with
him. "Abide in me, and I in you." But we can have no abiding in
Christ except we have first union with him. The Lord clearly
presupposes that the disciples to whom he was speaking had this
union with him. He says, "Abide in me," that is, 'ye are already in
me, continue in me;' as he says, (verse 9,) "Continue ye in my
love." But O, how many things there are that prevent this abiding
in Christ! Let us consider a few.

1. Unbelief, the power of unbelief—what an enemy—what a

desperate enemy is this to abiding in Christ! What is it that brings
the soul near to Christ, that gives it vital union with Jesus, and
makes him precious? Is it not living faith? Is not that the eye
which sees Christ? Is not that the hand which takes hold of
Christ, and brings him near? Is not that the ear that hears the
voice of Christ? Surely. Unbelief then is that mortal foe which
ever fights with desperate enmity against the life of faith in the
soul. When, then, we are filled with little else but unbelief, is
there any sensible abiding in Christ? We cannot at such moments
realize even our union with him at all. He is so distant that we
cannot get near unto, much less enjoy communion with him.

2. The power of sin is another thing that prevents the soul from
acting up to this divine exhortation, "Abide in me." O how sin, in
its workings within, in its mighty power, in its polluting
defilements, separates our souls from the object of our heart's
love! How it drives us, as I was speaking last Lord's day, to "the
ends of the earth!" How it intercepts and cuts off communion with
the Lord of life and glory!

3. Darkness of mind. O how the Lord's people have, for the most
part, to groan and lament under darkness of mind; and how
continually this prevents communion with the Lord Jesus Christ!
When we are in that state, as some of us doubtless often are,
where "we see not our signs;" when night rests upon our soul;
when we cannot find the way, nor that our feet are in the way;
when we can scarcely trace one mark of divine teaching within;
when Jesus is as little known to us as though there were no Jesus
at all, and as though we had never seen him nor believed in his
name—what power and prevalence this darkness of mind has to
intercept communion with the Lord of life and glory!

4. The cares and anxieties of the world laying hold of the heart,
stealing in upon the affections, burying the thoughts, and
overwhelming the mind with a flood of carnal solicitude—who that
knows the coming in of the world in this shape, does not know,
painfully know, how it breaks in upon the communion with the
Lord Jesus Christ!

5. The temptations of Satan; the fiery darts that he often casts

into our carnal mind; and the workings, the hideous workings of
evil, that are thence felt, deeply felt within—how these things all
conspire to prevent a firm and believing abiding in Christ.

But if there were no such hindrances, if there were no such

difficulties, would the Lord have said, "Abide in me?" He knew,
well knew, there was everything in us to prevent abiding in him.
That though, in rich grace, he had brought us near to himself; yet
there was everything in self, everything in sin, and everything in
the world, to intercept communion with him, and take us out of
that sweet, blessed, and spiritual state, in which we feelingly and
experimentally abide in him.

But I must not dwell upon one side of the question only, and
merely shew the hindrances to felt union and communion with
the Lord Jesus Christ. Let us look at the other side of the picture,
and see how we are enabled from time to time to abide in Jesus.
Be this never forgotten, that if we have ever been brought near
to the Lord Jesus Christ by the actings of living faith, there never
can be any final, actual separation from him. As far indeed as our
feelings are concerned, there is many an interposition to
communion with him, and fears too of final separation from him;
but there is never actual separation. In the darkest moments, in
the dreariest hours, under the most painful exercises, the most
fiery temptations, there is, as with Jonah in the belly of hell, a
looking again toward the holy temple. There is not an abandoning
of all hope, a going into the world, a giving up of all we have felt
in the Lord's name. There is sometimes a sigh, a cry, a groan, a
breathing forth of the heart's desire to "know him, and the power
of his resurrection;" that he would draw us near unto himself, and
make himself precious to our souls. And these very cries and
sighs, groanings and breathings, all prove that whatever darkness
of mind, guilt of conscience, or unbelief we may feel, there is no
real separation. It is in grace as it is in nature; the clouds do not
blot out the sun; it is still in the sky, though they often intercept
his bright rays. And so with the blessed Sun of Righteousness;
our unbelief, our ignorance; our darkness of mind, our guilt of
conscience, our many temptations—these do not blot out the Sun
of Righteousness from the sky of grace. Though thick clouds
come between him and us and make us feel as though he was
blotted out, or at least as if we were blotted from his
remembrance, yet, through mercy, where grace has begun the
work, grace carries it on; "Being confident of this very thing that
he which hath begun a good work in you will perform it until the
day of Jesus Christ." (Phil. 1:6.) Were it not so, there could be no
revivings of faith, hope, or love. But, through mercy, infinite
mercy, where the Lord has implanted his blessed graces of faith,
hope, and love, he waters them from time to time with the dews
of his grace; as he says, "In that day, sing ye unto her, a
vineyard of red wine. I the Lord do keep it; I will water it every
moment: lest any hurt it, I will keep it night and day." (Isa. 27:2,
3.)

Now the blessed Spirit is the sole author of communion with the
Lord. It is only under his secret operations and most divine
influences, that we are ever brought to the footstool of Jesus;
that our eyes are ever anointed with heavenly eye-salve to see
his beauty and glory; that our hearts ever pant after him as the
hart after the water-brooks; or that we ever feel anything like
union and communion with his most gracious Majesty.

But the blessed Spirit works by means. What are those means?

l. One means that he employs to bring about and keep alive this
abiding in Christ is faith. It is through faith that, in the first
instance, we have vital union with Christ; and it is through faith
that we have communion with him. And the stronger the faith is,
the more communion with his blessed Majesty there is. Now, the
blessed Spirit after he is pleased, in the first instance, to raise up
faith, waters his own grace in the soul, draws it forth into living
act and exercise, and thus fixes that faith upon, and makes it
centre in Jesus. Wherever faith is thus blessedly raised up and
drawn forth, union is revived, and communion blessedly
experienced.

2. The blessed Spirit makes use of the word of life. It is through

the word that the soul in the first instance is cleansed. "Now ye
are clean through the word which I have spoken unto you." (John
15:3.) It is by the word that the soul is begotten again unto
eternal life. It is too by the word applied to the heart that the
blessed Spirit from time to time keeps alive communion with the
Lord Jesus Christ. Is it not so in vital experience? Some passage
of Scripture drops into the soul, some promise comes warm into
the heart, and as it comes it makes way for itself. It enters the
heart, breaks down the feelings, melts the soul, and draws forth
living faith to flow unto and centre alone in the "altogether
lovely." There are many times and seasons when the word of God
is to us a dead letter; we see and feel no sweetness in it. But
there are other times, through mercy, when the word of God is
made sweet and precious to us; when we can say, with the
prophet of old, "Thy words were found, and I did eat them; and
thy word was unto me the joy and rejoicing of mine heart." (Jer.
15:16.) It was so in the case of David. He says, they are "more to
be desired than gold, yea, than much fine gold; sweeter also than
honey and the honeycomb." (Psa. 19:10.) When this is felt, the
sure effect is to bring the soul into communion with the Lord
Jesus, who is the true word of God, and makes use of the written
word to draw us near unto himself.

3. The blessed Spirit is pleased to make use also of prayer;

raising up a spirit of grace and supplications, and interceding for
us and in us "with groanings which cannot be uttered;" stirring us
up, enabling us to pour out our heart at the footstool, and giving
us power and inward strength whereby we plead with God, and
wrestle with him as Jacob did of old, "I will not let thee go, except
thou bless me." As the blessed Spirit is pleased to raise up these
pantings and longings within, he strengthens faith in the heart,
and there is a flowing forth of love to the Lord, whereby he is
embraced in the arms of the tenderest affection.

4. The blessed Spirit sometimes also sheds abroad love; and love
is a sweet seal of union and communion.

5. And lastly, not to mention others, the Spirit sometimes makes

use of conversation with the Lord's family. "Then they that feared
the Lord spake often one to another." (Mal. 3:16.) And as the
disciples found in journeying to Emmaus, "Did not our heart burn
within us, while he talked with us by the way, and while he
opened to us the Scriptures?" (Luke 24:32.)

And thus the blessed Spirit, in these various ways, maintains and
keeps alive communion with the Lord Jesus Christ.

"Abide in me." The Lord did not use these words as though there
were any power in the creature to abide in him. But he was
pleased to use them that they might be blessed to his people
when the Holy Spirit applied them to the heart; for, he adds,
"And I in you." The one is the key to the other. If we abide in
Christ, Christ abides in us. It is by Christ abiding in us, that we
are enabled to abide in him. But how does Christ abide in us? By
his Spirit. It is by his Spirit, he makes the bodies of his saints his
temple; it is by his Spirit, that he comes and dwells in them.
Though it is instrumentally by faith, as we read, "that Christ may
dwell in your hearts by faith:" yet it is through the
communication of his Spirit to the soul, and the visits of his most
gracious presence. Thus he bids us, encourages us, and
influences us to abide in him by his abiding in us.

But his abiding in a child of God may be known by certain effects

following. If he abide in you, he makes and keeps your
conscience tender. It is sin that separates between you and him.
Therefore, the Lord Jesus Christ, in order that he may abide in
you and make you abide in him, makes and keeps your
conscience tender in his fear. And this keeps you from those sins
which separate between you and him.

He may be known, then, to abide in you by the secret checks he

gives you when temptation comes before your eyes, and you are
all but gone; as one of old said, "My feet were almost gone; my
steps had well-nigh slipped." (Psa. 73:2.) He is pleased to give a
secret eternal [internal?] check and admonition; so that your
cry is, "How can I do this great wickedness, and sin against God?"
(Gen. 39:9.) And if you go astray and turn from the Lord to your
idols, as to our shame and sorrow we often do, he proves that he
still abides in you by not giving you up to a reprobate mind, not
suffering you to harden your heart against him; but by his
reproofs, admonitions, and secret checks in your conscience—by
the very lashings and scourgings which he inflicts upon you as a
father upon his child, and his secret pleadings with you in the
court of conscience—by all these things he makes it manifest that
he still abides in you.

Now these two things are the grand vital points that all Christians
should seek to be established in. The first is, Is he a believer in
Christ? Has the blessed Spirit made Christ known to his soul? Has
he embraced Jesus in the arms of living faith? The second point
which he should seek to have established in his soul is—Does he
abide in Christ? This he may know by having some testimony that
Christ abides in him, and produces the fruits that flow out of this
inward abiding. If Christ abide in him, his heart will not be like
the nether millstone. He cannot rush greedily into sin; he will not
love the world, and the things of time and sense; he cannot
happily love idols, or do those things which ungodly professors do
without one check or pang. Jesus in the soul is a guest that will
make himself known; yea, abiding there, he is King therein. He is
Ruler in Zion, and when he comes into the heart, he comes as
King. Being therefore, its rightful Sovereign, he sways the
faculties of the soul, and makes it obedient to his sceptre; for
"thy people shall be willing in the day of thy power;" (Psa.
110:3.) "O Lord our God, other lords beside thee have had
dominion over us; but by thee only will we make mention of thy
name." (Isa. 26:13.)

O search your hearts. God enable us in mercy to do so, and see

whether we have any testimony that we abide in Christ, by
knowing and feeling that Christ abides in us, and, depend upon it,
if Christ abide in us, there will be some marks and fruits flowing
out of that abiding; there will be some outward as well as inward
evidences that we are of another spirit from those dead in sins or
dead in profession. There will be humility, sincerity, godly
simplicity, and filial fear; deadness to the world, separation from
evil, lowly thoughts of ourselves, brokenness of heart, contrition
of Spirit, and tenderness of conscience; a fleeing from all things
here below to make our sweet abode in the bosom of a risen
Lord. Can we find these things going on in our souls? If not, we
may call ourselves believers, or Christians, or children of God, but
we have little evidence that we are worthy of the name.

II.—But we pass on, as time is waning, to consider what are the

fruits of thus abiding in Christ? "As the branch cannot bear fruit of
itself, except it abide in the vine; no more can ye, except ye
abide in me." Have you never seen in the winter the gardener
pruning a vine? What a heap of branches lie at the foot of the
tree after the keen knife has severed them. Will they ever bear
fruit again? Is not this their destiny—to be swept into the dung-
heap? And though I know that professors of religion never had
that vital union with Christ which the branches had with the vine
from which the pruning knife had severed them; yet the Lord
says, "Every branch in me that beareth not fruit, he taketh
away." (John 15:2.) There was not a vital union, I know; but
there was an apparent union. Those whom the husbandman takes
away, bore no fruit; they are gathered up, and their "end is to be
burned." (Heb. 6:8.) But on the other hand, wherever the branch
is left in the vine, it bears fruit; the object of the gardener is, that
it should bear more fruit, and he prunes it for that very purpose.

But what is the source of all the fruitfulness in the branch? Is it in

self? No, not in self, that we well know. It is the sap that flows
out of the stem into the branch that makes the branch fruitful. It
is so in nature; and the Lord has declared it is so with the true
branches of the only true vine. "As the branch cannot bear fruit of
itself, except it abide in the vine; no more can ye, except ye
abide in me." The only way whereby we can bring forth fruit to
God's honour and glory, is by abiding in the vine.

And is it not God's chief purpose in dealing with the souls of his
people to bring forth fruit in them? "Herein is my Father glorified,
that ye bear much fruit; so shall ye be my disciples." (verse 8.)
What are all God's chastenings, corrections, rebukes, and sharp
trials for? Are they not that we may bring forth fruit to his honour
and glory? But only in the same proportion as we abide in Christ
can we bring forth fruit. God enable us to see whether we bring
forth any!

Observe these two things. If you do not abide in Christ, you bring
forth no fruit; if you do abide in Christ, you are bringing forth
fruit. But what is the fruit that a branch brings forth by abiding in
the Vine? Is it all external fruit? External fruit is good. "By their
works ye shall know them." But there is internal fruit brought
forth by the Spirit in the court of conscience, as well as external
fruit brought forth in the life and conversation. For instance,

1. There is the fruit of humility. Is not that a precious fruit? "Be

clothed with humility." (1 Pet. 5:5.) But we cannot bring forth the
fruit of humility, real humility, except we have a vital union and
communion with the Man of Sorrows. And if we know anything of
union and communion with the Man of Sorrows, the bleeding
Lamb of God, there will be a transfusion of his humility into our
souls. "Let this mind be in you which was also in Christ Jesus."
(Phil. 2:5.) As we are led to look to Christ, believe in Christ, and
our heart's affections are attracted and drawn forth to Christ,
humility will flow into the soul, in the same way as the sap flows
out of the stem into the branches.

2. There will also be sincerity and godly simplicity. What is my

heart by nature but "a heart deceitful above all things and
desperately wicked?" (Jer. 17:9.) Can there be then any sincerity
in the heart by nature? No spiritual sincerity: there may be
natural sincerity; but that is no fruit of the Spirit. To be sincere
Godward; sincere in all we do, think, or speak in his name; to
have a single eye to his glory; to have the simplicity of a little
child before his gracious Majesty—where shall I go? whither shall
I look to find this precious grace of the Spirit? Oh, how I see
continually, and that more and more, how men are led by base
motives! Oh, how many men professing godliness, ministers and
hearers, do I see led by ambition, pride, self-interest, or
covetousness! How little do I see—I may say, how little do I feel
in myself—of that singleness of eye to God's glory which is such a
precious fruit of the Spirit in the soul!

3. Godly fear, reverence of the great name of Jehovah; a

conscience made and kept tender by him, a sight and sense of
evil, and a fleeing from it,—is not this another precious fruit that
is brought forth in the heart through abiding in Christ?

4. Faith in his blessed name, love towards his glorious Person,

hope in his blood and righteousness; patience under trials,
afflictions, temptations, and all the painful things that we have to
grapple with in this vale of tears; perseverance to the end,
amidst a thousand inward conflicts and many outward foes—are
not these, too, inward fruits of the Spirit brought about through
abiding in Christ by living faith?

5. Prayerfulness, watchfulness, self-denial; brokenness of heart,

contrition of spirit, sorrow for sin; mourning over our weak and
wayward heart; panting and longing after his manifested
presence; crucifixion of self in all its varied shapes and forms—
are not these, too, inward fruits and graces that are brought forth
by abiding in Christ?

Where these inward fruits are, there will be outward fruits;

inward fruits first, outward fruits next; inward fruits before God,
outward fruits before man. If we abide in Christ; if we have union
and communion with him; if we live unto and live upon him, and
he abide in us, we cannot have these choice blessings, and be
like professors buried in carnality and covetousness. There will
be, there must be, marks, outward marks, whereby we shall be,
we must be, distinguished from them.

But all these fruits, whether inward or outward, spring from one
source—union and communion with the lowly Lamb of God. Be
this never forgotten. It is not my doing this, or my doing that—I
may do a thousand things, and yet all spring from base motives,
because they spring from selfish motives. But if the Lord is
pleased to lead me, as a poor, ruined wretch, as a guilty, needy
sinner, to the footstool of mercy, and there opens up to my heart
and conscience the love and blood of the Lamb, give me union to
Jesus, and maintain communion with him—every grace and fruit
of the Spirit will be found in me, just in the same way as the
strength of the stem is made manifest by the strength of the
branch, and the strength of the branch is maintained by its
abiding in the stem.

You may be tried, some of you, that you bear so little fruit. You
look into your own heart, and see little or no fruit there; you look
to your lives, and see little or no fruit there. But perhaps you are
mistaken (and we are apt to be mistaken) as to the way whereby
fruit is to be brought forth. You read, you pray, you strive, you do
your best; and yet you always fail; and you will fail to the end.
And a blessed thing it is to fail; for all these failures are meant to
bring you into a fleeing away from self-righteousness in all its
shapes and forms to a cleaving to the Son of God—to have no
faith, no hope, no humility, no patience in yourselves; but that
the Lord may work in us to will and to do according to his own
good pleasure, and bring forth those things which are well-
pleasing in his sight. And this is the only way whereby we can
bring forth divine fruit. The Apostle declares expressly, that we
are divorced from our first husband, the law, and married to
another, even to him who is raised from the dead, that we should
bring forth fruit unto God. And there is no other way whereby
fruit can be brought forth for our good, and God's glory.
THE ABIDING COMFORTER

Preached at North Street Chapel, Stamford, on Lord's Day

Morning, November 14th, 1858

"And I will pray the Father, and He shall give you another
Comforter, that He may abide with you for ever; even the Spirit
of truth, whom the world cannot receive, because it seeth Him
not, neither knoweth Him: but ye know Him: for He dwelleth with
you, and shall be in you." John 14:16, 17

What an evening was that which preceded the memorable night

in which the Lord of life and glory sweat great drops of blood in
the garden of Gethsemane; that gloomy night which ushered in a
still more gloomy day on which the Son of God was nailed to the
accursed tree at Calvary! Could we roll back the tide of more than
eighteen hundred years, and be transported in spirit to
Jerusalem, what scenes that evening would there meet our
astonished eye! We should see the streets of the city crowded
with multitudes, not only of its own citizens, but of sojourners
also from all parts of the neighbouring countries who had come
up to keep the Passover; and we should view this vast
assemblage surging and heaving like the troubled sea, as
expecting some mighty event to take place. Some of them would
be half believing that Jesus of Nazareth was the promised
Messiah; but the greater part would be filled with enmity and
prejudice against Him because He had not come as they
expected, in all the power and pomp of kingly majesty, to put the
abhorred Roman eagles to ignominious flight! We should see
Pontius Pilate, the Roman governor, sitting at his feast, amid the
cups of flowing wine, little dreaming of the important part that he
was to play in the great event of the morrow. We should view the
chief priests, Scribes and Pharisees, all assembled in secret
conclave, plotting the death of the innocent Lamb of God, and
amongst them we might descry a dark form flitting to and fro,
one doomed by the just sentence of God to eternal perdition, and
condemned by the universal concurrence of men to everlasting
infamy—the traitor Judas, holding out his itching palm for the
proffered reward of blood. But turning our eyes from these, and
fixing them on a solitary spot, in an upper chamber, we should
see the blessed Lord sitting in the midst of His eleven faithful
disciples, addressing Himself to comfort their sorrowful hearts,
and speaking in their ears those gracious words which have been
preserved by the Holy Ghost through the pen of John, and which
we have now before us for our instruction and consolation. It is
true that we cannot transport ourselves thither in spirit; that we
cannot see the Lord's face, or hear the Lord's voice; but we can,
with God's help, listen with holy reverence and solemn attention
to the words which fell from His lips on that memorable evening.
And if the Lord the Spirit be pleased to touch my lips this morning
with His unction and grace, and to anoint your ear and heart with
the same divine power, I may speak and you may hear words
that may profit, instruct, edify and comfort your souls.

The Lord Jesus Christ, from whose omniscience nothing was

concealed, saw that His disciples' hearts were filled with sorrow.
He had told them that He was about to leave them, and it broke
their hearts to think of His departure. His presence with then had
been so full of blessing; He had so comforted them in their
various distresses, had been such a shield against all their
enemies, had so revealed to them His grace and truth, and had
so manifested His glory, that the very thought of His departure
filled their hearts with grief, for in losing Him they felt that they
should lose their all. They little thought how that departure would
take place, and what a scene would present itself before their
eyes on the coming day; for the deep mystery of the Cross was
at that time hidden from them, and they saw in it for their Master
nothing but agony and shame, and for themselves the total wreck
of all their hopes. Addressing Himself then to console their
sorrowing hearts, Jesus lays before them this grand truth, that it
was expedient for them that He should go away; for that if He
went not away, they could not have the promised Comforter, who
was to abide with them for ever. As this is the chief point that
presents itself in the words of our text, I now proceed, with God's
blessing, to open it up. And in so doing, I shall direct your
attention:—

I. First, to the Blessed Spirit of promise, and I shall endeavour to

show why He is called "the Comforter" and "the Spirit of truth."

II. Secondly, that the world cannot receive this Comforter, this
Spirit of truth; and the reason, "because it seeth Him not, neither
knoweth Him."

III. Thirdly, that the saint of God does know Him, and that by a
personal work upon his heart and conscience.

IV. And fourthly, the sweet promise, that He dwelleth with them,
and shall be in them.

I. The Lord Jesus Christ speaks here of the gift of the Spirit as
being the first fruit of His intercession at the right hand of God:
"And I will pray the Father, and He shall give you another
Comforter." Observe the word "give" and the almost similar
expression "send." "But the Comforter, which is the Holy Ghost,
whom the Father will send in My Name." I do not hold that the
blessed Spirit, or any one of His gifts and graces, was purchased
by the atoning blood of the Lamb—an expression we frequently
meet with—but that they were the fruits of His intercession. The
gift of the Holy Spirit and His divine mission were as much a part
of the covenant of grace as the gift and mission of the Son of
God. Regeneration and sanctification are as indispensable to the
soul's entering the courts of heaven as redemption and
justification; and had these been left out of the eternal covenant,
redemption would have been of no avail, for "without holiness no
man can see the Lord" (Heb. 12:14). Is not, then, the Holy
Ghost, as a Person in the Godhead, as much a party to the
everlasting covenant as the Father and the Son? and would it be
consistent with the dignity of His Person that He, with His gifts
and graces, should have been purchased by the atoning blood of
the Son? The gifts and graces of God the Holy Ghost were as
much a part of the "everlasting covenant, ordered in all things
and sure," as the electing love of God the Father and the
redeeming blood of God the Son, and therefore stand upon the
same foundation. But let me not be misunderstood. The
sufferings and death of the Lord Jesus Christ were the appointed
channel through which the gifts and graces of the Holy Ghost
were to come. But for His death they could not have been given,
for in the order of things redemption must precede sanctification.
Sin must be put away before mercy can be revealed; the sacrifice
must be offered before its merits and benefits can be applied; but
that by no means implies that the one purchased the other, or
that because the one precedes and is the foundation of the other,
that it should be said to have bought it. The blood-shedding and
sacrifice of the Son of God opened a way whereby God,
consistently with all His perfections, could bestow upon His people
the gifts and graces of the Holy Ghost. But I do not believe that
there was any bargain, so to speak, between the Father and the
Son, whereby these gifts and graces were bought and purchased
by atoning blood. Mast certainly they are spoken of in our text as
a gift; and a gift excludes purchase. I view, therefore, the gift of
the Comforter, and of everything implied by that expression, as
the first fruits of the intercession of Jesus. "I will pray the
Father."

But if enabled to look upwards, what a glorious view these words

open before our eyes, introducing us, as it were, into the very
courts of heaven, there to see an interceding High Priest at the
right hand of God! This intercession was beautifully prefigured by
what took place on the great day of atonement under the
Levitical law. On that solemn day the high priest entered the
most holy place with incense beaten small, which as he went in
he scattered upon live coals taken from off the brazen altar. As
then he entered the most holy place with the blood of the bullock
and the goat, the fragrant steam of the incense filled the
sanctuary as with a cloud; the coals typifying the wrath of God,
and the incense beaten small the bruised humanity of the Lord
Jesus Christ. Thus the incense of Christ's work upon earth, of His
blood and sufferings and obedience here below, fills the courts of
heaven as if with an ever-rising, ever-enduring cloud, as the
prophet in vision saw "the house of the Lord filled with smoke"
(Isa. 6:4). When, then, the blessed Lord said, "I will pray the
Father," we need not necessarily attach such a meaning to the
words as if they implied that He uses vocal prayer. His presence
in heaven is prayer. "He ever liveth to make intercession for us."
And this intercession was typified by the act of Aaron, when he
took the censer and put fire therein from off the altar and put on
incense, and thus stood between the dead and the living (Num.
16:46-48). In this sense Jesus "prays the Father," and the first
fruit of His intercession is the gift of the Comforter, as was first
strikingly seen on the day of Pentecost, and is from time to time
realised by every saint of God who receives the Spirit and is
blessed by His presence and grace.

i. But let us, with God's blessing, examine a little more closely the
words that the blessed Lord spoke, and whereby He brings before
our eyes more distinctly who and what this promised Comforter
is. The Lord Himself when here below was the Comforter of His
people. Whilst He was with them, they needed no other; but
when He left them they required one to supply His place. They
wanted one who could be to them what Jesus had been. How
plainly we gather from this the Deity and distinct personality of
the Holy Ghost! When Jesus was present with them, it was His
Person that comforted and shielded them. To supply His place
was not therefore a Person needed? How short of this would fall
an influence, an emanation, a virtue, or any other such inferior a
consolation! Any person, too, that was not Divine and equal with
Jesus could not fill His place, or be to them what Jesus had been.
Let us, therefore, hold fast by the Deity and personality of the
Holy Spirit. Those who deny them have neither part nor lot in His
teachings or consolations, in His regeneration or His
sanctification.

1. But what the disciples wanted all other true disciples of Jesus
equally need—a Comforter who can speak peace to their hearts,
who can relieve the various troubles and sorrows through which
they are called upon to pass, and that by administering an inward
consolation which shall be an effectual remedy. Here lies the vast
difference between the comfort that the world bestows and that
which is communicated by the Holy Spirit. The world has to a
certain extent its comforts to give; in fact, we are surrounded on
every side by a vast number of earthly comforts; but these can
speak no peace or pardon to a troubled conscience; these can
take no load of guilt off a burdened soul; these can give no sweet
anticipations of eternal joy when life comes to a close; these
cannot smooth a dying pillow, rob death of its sting, or spoil the
grave of its victory. Here everything falls short but the
consolations of the blessed Spirit.

2. But besides this the saints of God are called upon for the most
part to pass through many trials and afflictions in this vale of
tears. Their very character, as determined by the mouth of God,
is to be "an afflicted and poor people," as much as "to trust in the
name of the Lord" (Zeph. 3:12). It is "through much tribulation
that they are to enter the kingdom" (Acts 14:22). And as these
afflictions and tribulations are chiefly internal, they need an
internal Comforter to relieve and comfort them under their weight
and pressure. Many of the Lord's family are pressed down
exceedingly with guilt and distress of mind on account of their
sins against a holy God. Can earthly comforts relieve these
distressing pangs? Can they remove this heavy burden of guilt?
Can they pour oil and wine into this bleeding conscience? No;
they need a deliverance, a remedy, a consolation that can reach
their case; and as this is beyond all human help, none but the
Comforter, the Holy Ghost, can whisper it into their souls.
Spiritual maladies lie too deep for any other remedy. The same
hand which shot the arrow can alone extract it. A woe is
pronounced against those who "heal the hurt of God's people
slightly" (Jer. 6:14). Only He, then, who brings health and cure
can reveal to the soul "the abundance of peace and truth" (Jer.
33:6).

3. But besides the affliction of a troubled mind and a guilty

conscience that every saint of God is called upon to pass through
at one time or other of his earthly pilgrimage, which above all
other troubles makes a Comforter so needful, and when He
comes so valued, there are few of the living family who have not
many trials and sorrows spread in their path. Circumstances arise
in Providence as connected with their daily business or occupation
which often deeply and acutely try their mind. Nor is it always
with them as regards their families as they would have it to be.
They may have, with David, to lament that their "house is not so
with God," that is so favoured and blessed as he himself was (2
Sam. 23:5). They would fain see their children walking in the
strait and narrow path that leads to eternal life, but rarely find a
favour so great. As David had to mourn over the vile lust of
Amnon and the rebellion of Absolom, so some of the saints of
God have even to mourn over profligate or rebellious children,
whom no discipline can control or kindness alter. Under these
trials they need special support to reconcile their minds in
submission to God's sovereignty. As Aaron held his peace when
he saw his two sons consumed by fire from heaven at the very
altar (Lev. 10:1, 2); as David had a blessed persuasion that the
Lord had made with him an everlasting covenant, though his
house was not with God as he could wish; so many of the most
highly favoured saints have had to put their mouth into the dust
before God in solemn silence, and to submit to His holy will. But
can they do this without special grace? Do not they almost above
all others need the Comforter to support them under such
heartrending trials? Who else can silence the murmurs of their
rebellious heart, and bend and bow it into submission to these
heavy strokes?

4. Many, too, of the choicest of God's people have to drink the

bitter cup of poverty, to labour hard for the bread that perisheth.
But that bread is scanty, and their minds are often filled with
anxiety as to the coming morrow, whence a fresh supply is to
come. These also need an inward Comforter to stay their
murmurings and fretfulness, and to set before their eyes how
their Master "had not where to lay His head"; how He was "a Man
of sorrows," and passed through this world as a poor, despised
carpenter's son. Poverty is one of the greatest of earthly trials,
and has a peculiar tendency to stir up unbelief, as well as
fretfulness and envy against those who seem to be more
favourably dealt with. But the blessed Spirit, the Comforter, can
subdue every murmuring thought, and can so bless the soul with
inward consolation, that poverty and want lose their keen edge,
and a crust with the Lord's blessing may become sweeter food
than all the delicacies under which the tables of the wealthy
groan.

5. Many, too, of the Lord's people are suffering under bodily

disease. Their body is racked with pain, or their constitution is
shattered with ailments of long standing, or their nerves are weak
and trembling, or their general health broken by multiplied
afflictions. This often causes inward murmuring, fretfulness, and
rebellion, for few trials are heavier than continued ill health.
Hence the need of a Comforter to support them under the pain
and languor of an afflicted tabernacle; and whilst they are thus
reminded that their time is but short and that life itself is held by
a slender thread, so to manifest the power of His grace that as
"the outward man perisheth, so the inward man may be renewed
day by day."

6. But time will not suffice to enumerate a tenth of the numerous

trials and afflictions that the Lord's people have to pass through.
They have temptations also which in some respects are harder to
bear and need more special help. Their own treacherous,
unstable, and wicked heart is continually presenting snares in
which their unwary feet are too readily caught, and they have to
prove again and again, to their sorrow and shame, the truth of
the word:

"Seldom do we see the snares

Before we feel the smart."

Satan, too, is continually tempting them to despair, or infidelity,

it may be, even to suicide, and distressing their mind with many
suggestions which, though groundless, appear at the time to
have some solid foundation. Under these temptations they need
that special relief and consolation which nothing short of the
Spirit of God can communicate. For when sorely pressed down by
the weight of temptation, they deeply feel that His inward
comforts alone can relieve their distress or speak a solid peace to
their souls.

ii. But the Lord speaks of this blessed Comforter under another
title: He calls Him the "Spirit of truth." We are surrounded with
error, the carnal heart is full of it; for wherever truth is not, there
error must be. A veil of ignorance is by nature spread thickly over
the mind, through which not one ray of divine light penetrates.
Men love error—I mean religious error—for God's own testimony
is that they "love darkness rather than light, because their deeds
are evil" (John 3:19). They love to be deceived; they hate the
hand which would rend the delusion asunder. Whilst then they
are encompassed with the mists of error, how can they find the
way to truth? The Lord the Spirit alone can dissipate these
clouds, disperse these mists, and take away this veil of unbelief
and ignorance spread over the heart; and this it is His sacred
office to perform, for He is the "Spirit of truth."

1. But why we may ask, does He bear from the Lord's own lips
this sacred title: "the Spirit of truth"? Because it is His
prerogative to unfold truth to the soul, to engraft it into the
heart, and to make the saints of God vitally and experimentally
acquainted with it. I say vitally and experimentally, because we
may know truth in the letter without the teaching of the Spirit.
We may have a sound creed, a form of words perfectly consistent
with the outward revelation of truth in the Scriptures; but this will
neither sanctify nor save. Truth in the bare letter brings no
deliverance from the guilt, filth, love, power, and practice of sin;
brings not the soul near unto God, repels not Satan, sets not up
the kingdom of God with power in the heart. We need a better
teaching than this. We need "the Spirit of truth," whose especial
office is to take the truth of God, and to open up, reveal, make
known, apply, and seal it with His own gracious operation, divine
influence, and holy power upon the heart and conscience. Do not
you who fear His great name find at times darkness pervading
your souls—an Egyptian darkness, a darkness that may be felt—
so that there seems not a ray of divine light in your breast?
Whence comes this dreary feeling, this sinking down of your
whole soul under the power of darkness, as the earth sinks under
the power of the shades of night? Because the Spirit of truth has
come into your heart to convince you of the darkness in which
you were born, and to show you that it still hovers as deeply as
ever over your carnal mind. Remember this, that as the carnal
mind is ever "enmity against God," darkness wholly possesses it;
for as love is light, enmity is darkness, and the light of life has no
more penetrated the carnal mind than the love of God. It is light
in your spiritual mind that makes you see this darkness; it is the
teaching of God's Spirit in your soul that makes you groan and
sigh beneath it. Now as you mourn and sigh under this darkness
you feel the indispensable necessity of the Spirit of truth to open
up, apply, reveal, and make known the truth of God to your soul,
for you can no more give yourself light than give yourself faith or
love. But, through rich and unspeakable mercy, there are times
and seasons when a spiritual light seems to shine upon the
sacred page. You read the Bible with enlightened eyes. Power and
sweetness seem to stream, as it were, in rich unction through the
Word of truth, and as you read it with softened heart and tearful
eyes, the truth of God shines from it into your understanding as
brightly and as clearly as the sun in the noonday sky. You wonder
how anyone can doubt or deny the truth of God; it is so clear to
you that you think he who runs may read. And why? Because the
Spirit of truth is opening it up to your understanding and applying
it with power to your heart. You wonder how any man who reads
the Bible can deny the Deity of Christ, His eternal Sonship, the
atoning blood, the justifying righteousness, the dying love of the
Lord the Lamb. You wonder how any man can read the Bible and
deny the covenant of grace, the electing love of God, the full
salvation wrought out by His dear Son, and the regenerating work
of the Holy Ghost. Why is the matter so clear to you? Because the
Spirit of truth is illuminating your mind, radiating light from the
Scriptures into your soul, and opening up the truth of God with
divine power to your heart. This He does as the Spirit of truth, for
as the Spirit of truth He makes the Word of God to be spirit and
life to the soul.

2. But not only at times do you see the truth of God plainly and
clearly, but you believe as well as see. There is a divine
movement in your soul, whereby your heart is brought under the
holy influence and sacred impression of God's truth. As the wax
to the seal, as the clay to the potter's hand, so your heart is
softened and melted within you, and you receive God's truth
stamped upon your heart with a heavenly hand. Does not this
show that the Spirit of truth is not only enlightening your
understanding, but quickening your conscience, renewing your
heart, and spreading a divine influence through your soul? Truth
by itself can only stand at the portal, or look in at the window; it
cannot come within to regenerate or renew; but the Spirit of truth
enters with truth in His mouth, and breathes it into the heart as a
living breath, as the prophet saw in "the valley of vision," for till
"the breath" came into the slain they did not live (Ezek. 37:10).

3. Under this sacred and spiritual influence there are times and
seasons when your conscience seems in an especial manner
wrought upon. The evil of sin is set before you as perhaps you
have never seen it before. Your conscience bleeds with the guilt
and weight of it. You see what an awful and an evil thing sin is,
how loathsome, how detestable! You could almost weep tears of
blood that you have been such a sinner. Your backslidings rise up
to view as so many mountains of iniquity. The wickedness of your
heart is laid bare, and you feel that there cannot be such another
wretch on earth. Your corrupt nature is opened up in its filth and
gore; you wonder how the long suffering of God could have borne
with you so many years in the wilderness. And not only so, but
tears flow down your cheek; sobs of contrition heave from your
breast; you could almost weep your life away, because you have
sinned so deeply against such love and against such blood. Why
is this? The Spirit of truth is breathing upon your conscience, and
the feeling of sin there is His work.

4. Then, again, there are times and seasons when your heart
seems in a special manner lifted up to heavenly things. It is as if
a live coal from off the altar touched your inmost affections. You
see Jesus by the eye of faith at the right hand of the Father; your
heart goes out after Him in love and affection; you feel that, be
you what you may, you do love Him with every faculty of your
soul, and your desire is to live to His praise, and die in the sweet
enjoyment of His love shed abroad in your heart. And yet you feel
that you never can upon earth love Him as He is to be loved. You
must have an immortal tongue to sing His praise, and a glorified
soul to hold all that His love can bestow. Why is this? Because the
Spirit of truth is love in your affections.

In this way, then, we have the Spirit of truth as light in the

understanding, life in the heart, feeling in the conscience, and
love in the affections; and by these four things He is made vitally
and experimentally known to the saints of God as the Spirit of
truth. Can the letter of truth, however clear or sound, do all this?
Can a sound creed or a mere form of words effect a work in the
least degree approaching to it? I feel sure they cannot, for words
as words cannot reach beyond the surface; they cannot sink or
penetrate into the very core of the heart's deepest feeling. It is
therefore indispensably necessary that the Spirit of truth should
put, as it were, a soul into the body of truth, or to speak more
correctly, should Himself regenerate, renew and sanctify the saint
of God that he may have a living union and communion with the
Lord of life and glory; for "he that is joined to the Lord is one
spirit," and he becomes this when he is baptised by the Holy
Ghost into that spiritual baptism which makes him a living
member of the body of Christ.

II. But I pass on to show how the world thinks, speaks and acts
with respect to this promised "Comforter," this "Spirit of truth."
The Lord says, "Whom the world cannot receive." Aye, it stands
as good now as it stood good then. The world cannot now receive
the Comforter, the Spirit of truth, one whit more than it could
receive Him then. And why cannot the world receive Him? It is
too full of sin and self. If you have a pitcher filled with dirty
water, is there room in it for clean water? If a vessel be filled with
clay up to the very brim, is there room in it for gold and silver
and precious stones? The world is full—full of pride, ignorance,
prejudice, self-righteousness, unbelief and selfishness. Then what
room is there for the Comforter, the Spirit of truth? "My Word,"
said the Lord to the Pharisees, "hath no place in you." They could
not receive it, for their hearts were barred against it.

1. But the Lord Himself gives two reasons why the world cannot
receive the Spirit of truth. The first is, "It seeth Him not;" the
second is, "It knoweth Him not." The world—that is, the world
dead in sin, and the world dead in profession, men generally
destitute of the life and power of God—must have something that
it can see. It cannot receive that which it sees not. Nature, sense,
reason can never go beyond earthly things; thus, whilst men
have no divine faith, they are under the entire influence of their
natural minds; and, as heavenly things can only be seen by
heavenly eyes, they cannot receive the things which are invisible.
Things must be either presented to their natural eye, or be such
as their rational understanding can grasp, or they cannot and will
not receive them. Now this explains why a religion that presents
itself with a degree of beauty and grandeur to the natural eye will
always be received by the world, whilst a spiritual, internal,
heartfelt and experimental religion will always be rejected. The
world can receive a religion that consists of forms, rites, and
ceremonies. These are things seen. Beautiful buildings, painted
windows, pealing organs, melodious choirs, the pomp and parade
of an earthly priesthood, and a whole apparatus of religious
ceremony, carry with them something that the natural eye can
see and admire. The world receives all this external worship
because suitable to the natural mind and intelligible to the
reasoning faculties. But the quiet, inward, experimental, divine
religion, which presents no attractions to the outward eye, but is
wrought in the heart by a divine operation, the world cannot
receive this, because it presents nothing that the natural eye can
rest upon with pleasure, or is adapted to gratify the general idea
of what religion is or should be.

2. "Neither knoweth Him." The world knows nothing of divine

consolation, because it knows nothing of spiritual grief and
sorrow. Hardened in sin, careless in self-righteousness, or
steeped up to the lips in an empty profession, what do men care
to know about an inward Comforter? Their religion, such as it is,
has never cost them an hour's uneasiness or brought their heart
down with trouble and distress. If, according to Paul's rule, "as
the sufferings of Christ abound, so consolation aboundeth also by
Christ" (2 Cor. 1:5), where there is no suffering, there can be no
consolation. Not knowing, then, for themselves anything of the
inward consolations of the Spirit, they cannot believe there is
such a thing known to the saint of God. "Fanaticism, enthusiasm,
stuff, madness, ridiculous nonsense, bigotry, a bad spirit," any
term that can be used, any which comes the easiest to hand, will
be launched with many an angry invective against that religion
which mainly consists in the love and power of the Holy Ghost.
And why? For this reason, because they do not themselves know
the consolations bestowed upon the saints of God, nor are they
acquainted with the work and witness of the Spirit of truth in
their own heart and conscience. Marvel not, then, that worldly
professors despise a religion wrought in the soul by the power of
God. Be not surprised if even your own relatives think you almost
insane when you speak of the consolations of the Spirit or of the
teachings of God in your soul. They cannot receive these things,
for they have no experience of them, and being such as are
altogether opposed to the carnal mind, they reject them with
enmity and scorn. It is surprising that men with the Bible in their
hands, and read as it is so much in public and private, should set
themselves so desperately against what is so plainly declared
therein. Our Lord's own words, if they were not His, would be
called by thousands "fanaticism" and "enthusiasm"; for the
moment that they are opened up and brought forward as present
realities, they arouse a very storm of indignation. Men can read
them or bear to hear them read as long as they are merely in the
Bible. The sword in the sheath is not dreaded, for it inflicts no
wounds; but the naked sword cuts too deeply not to arouse
enmity against its keen strokes. It was so when the Lord spake
the words; it is so now when His words in the mouth of His
servants have point and edge.

But if the Lord has given to any of you eyes to see and hearts to
receive this divine Comforter, praise, bless, and adore your God
and Father, and most merciful Benefactor, for His distinguishing
grace in giving you to know Him as your Comforter; and if He has
ever dropped into your soul any of His sweet teachings, bless Him
that you have received Him also as the Spirit of truth into your
conscience. What but sovereign grace—rich, free and
superabounding—has made the difference between you and
them? But for His divine operations upon your soul, you would
still be of the world, hardening your heart against everything
good and godlike, walking on in the pride and ignorance of
unbelief and self-righteousness, until you sank down into the
chambers of death. O, it is a mercy if but one drop of heavenly
consolation has ever been distilled into your soul; if ever you
have felt or found any relief in your sorrows and distresses from
the work and witness of the Holy Ghost; if you have ever
gathered any solid comfort from any promise applied with power,
from any text dropped into your heart with a sealing testimony,
from any manifestation of the love and blood of Christ, or from
any communication of liberty, joy, or peace, such as are
produced by the operation and influence of the Spirit of God. It
may have been but little, nor did it last long, but it has given you
a taste of its blessedness, and made you long for another sip,
another crumb, another visit. But look to it well, and examine
carefully whether it be real, and whether, weighed in the balance
of the sanctuary, you have good ground for believing that what
you received with such comfort to your soul was distilled into
your heart by the Comforter, and that the truth which you have
felt and believed, as well as professed, has been opened up to
your conscience by the Spirit of truth. And this leads me to our
third point, which is:

III. The difference that the Lord draws between His disciples, and
by implication all the saints of God, and the world—"But ye know
Him." The disciples of the Lord Jesus were very weak and
ignorant. They closed their ears to the very last to the Lord's
declarations as to His dying the death of the cross. And even
when He died before their very eyes, they were as slow to believe
in His promised resurrection. Considering the opportunities which
they had of daily intercourse with Him and of instruction from His
lips, we are tempted to wonder at their unbelief; and yet, with all
their weakness and ignorance, they knew something vitally and
experimentally of the Spirit's work upon their hearts. It may be
so with some of you. You may be very weak, very doubting, very
fearing, very unbelieving. The natural, deep-seated unbelief of
your heart may at times seem to have great power over you, and
you may often have reason to say, "I would believe, but cannot."
Still you may know, as the disciples knew, something, if not
much, of the work of the Comforter, and something, if not much,
of the teaching of the Spirit of truth. The Lord assured His
disciples that there was a wide and fundamental difference
between them and the world. "But ye know Him." May I say the
same to you: "Ye know Him"? But if so, may I not further ask:
What has that Comforter done for you as a Comforter? What has
that Spirit of truth revealed and made manifest to you as the
Spirit of truth? Let us examine for a few moments how He is
made known to the family of God, and what He does by His
power and grace in their heart and conscience.

1. First, He convinces of sin; that is His special office. He, opens

up the law, discovers the curse attached to it, makes the soul feel
its spirituality, its breadth, and length, and condemning authority.
Do you know this Spirit as a Spirit of conviction in having
convinced you of sin? Has He ever laid guilt upon your conscience
by opening up the law, and condemning you as a transgressor
against it, so that you have put your mouth in the dust and
confessed you were guilty before God? If you have felt conviction
of sin by the Holy Ghost, you know Him; if not as a Comforter,
yet as preparing the way for comfort. You know Him in His killing,
if not in His reviving; in His bringing down, if not in His raising
up; in His discovering sin, if not in revealing salvation.

2. But He is known also as a Spirit of grace and of supplications.

When the Lord is pleased to awaken the soul by HisSpirit and
grace, He gives Him as an internal intercessor to, intercede "with
groanings that cannot be uttered." Was that ever given to you, so
that upon your bended knees you besought the Lord with that
earnestness, that sincerity, that pouring out of the heart before
Him, with all that simplicity and brokenness, with those tears and
sighs, which mark and manifest His internal intercession, and
distinguish it from mere formal prayer? If so, you have received
Him as a Spirit of grace and of supplications; you "know Him."

3. But has He ever dropped an encouraging word into your heart?

As you have sat to hear me or any other minister opening up the
work of grace upon the soul, exalting the Lord the Lamb,
speaking of His blood and righteousness, tracing out the sacred
work of God upon the conscience, have you felt an internal
testimony that these things you know for yourself in the depths
of your own heart? Then you know Him, for it is He who has
given you this encouraging testimony; it is He who blessed the
Word with a witnessing power to your conscience.

4. Or have you ever had a revelation of Christ to your soul? Did

you ever see Him by the eye of faith at the right hand of God?
This can only be by the testimony of the Spirit, for it is His
covenant office to take of the things of Christ and to reveal them
to the soul. He glorifies Christ by manifesting Him. If you have
seen Christ by the eye of faith, if you have had a manifestation of
the Son of God and a revelation of Him with power to your soul,
"you know Him," because it is He who gave you that most
blessed manifestation, such as eye hath not seen, nor ear heard,
nor hath it entered into the heart of man.

5. Has Jesus ever been made precious to your heart? Did you
ever hold Him, as it were, in the arms of faith, as a mother clasps
her babe to her bosom, and love Him with a pure heart fervently?
Who kindled that love? Who touched your heart with that sacred
flame? The Comforter, the Spirit of truth. Then you know Him; for
"the love of God is shed abroad in the heart by the Holy Ghost."

6. Have you ever experienced any of that spirituality of mind

which is life and peace, any lifting up of your affections to things
above, where Jesus sits at God's right hand, so that you felt that
earth was no place for you; the things of time and sense you
could tread under your feet; and your heart was so taken up with
the blessed things of eternity, that they became the very element
in which your soul could bathe, the only happiness you knew
below? Then "you know Him," because it was He, and He alone,
who lifted up your heart and affections to these heavenly things.

7. Do you love the saints of God? Can you say, with all your
darkness, and doubt, and fear, that you do love the image of
Christ which you see in His people? that taking away all other
evidences, this seems still to you so plain that you cannot deny it,
and Satan cannot beat you out of it, that you do love those who
love Jesus? Whence comes this love? From the Spirit of truth and
love, who alone can enable us to love the saints as we love the
Saviour, to love the members as we love the Head. Then "you
know Him."

8. Has any deliverance ever come to you from the power of

temptation? Have you had any manifestation of the sufferings of
the Lord of life and glory; any solemn, heart-melting views of the
garden of Gethsemane; any standing at the cross of Calvary; any
view by the eye of faith of the blood that fell from the Redeemer's
sacred brow as surcharged with sorrow in the garden, or crowned
with thorns upon the cross; any sympathy, any union, any fellow-
feeling with the Man of Sorrows? Whence came this? By the Spirit
of Truth, the Comforter. Then "you know Him."

9. Has your heart ever felt true repentance for sin, any godly
sorrow, any forsaking of your bosom lusts, any breaking to pieces
of your fondest idols, any loosening of earthly ties, any
willingness to crucify the flesh with the affections and lusts? The
Spirit of truth alone can accomplish this. Then "you know Him."

10. Has the fear of death ever been removed? Did you ever look
that gaunt king of terrors in the face? Did you ever look beyond
the narrow isthmus of time and the dark and dreary river which
flows between you and eternity, and believe that when death
came it would be a messenger from the Lord to take your soul
into His bosom? Has the Lord ever been made so dear, near, and
precious that you have felt as if you could gladly drop the body
and mount on eagle's wings from earth to heaven? Then "you
know Him "; for who but He could deliver you from the fear of
death, and make you, instead of shrinking from him with terror,
even welcome the last enemy as your best friend? To have felt
this, is it not to have known the Spirit as the Comforter?

And oh what a blessing it is also to have received the same

gracious and heavenly Teacher as the Spirit of truth! If this be
your happy case, you know the truth for yourself, and the truth is
dear to your soul; it has been ingrafted by a divine witness in
your heart, and inlaid by the power of God in your conscience.
The truth as it is in Jesus is very, very precious to you. You
cannot part with it; it is your very life. Sooner than part with
God's truth and your interest therein, you would be willing in
favoured moments to lay down your life itself. But what makes
you love God's truth? What has given you a heart to embrace and
delight in it; and when you have come to the house of prayer, it
may be with a fainting body and a troubled mind, has yet
supported your weary steps and brought you in; or when you
have gone home from hearing the Word, has cheered your heart
in the dark and gloomy night as you have lain upon your bed, and
drawn your affections up to the Lord Jesus Christ? The Comforter,
the Spirit of truth. He, and He alone, could give it so firm and
enduring a place in your heart, conscience, and affections.

Then live that truth, as well as love it, and proclaim its power and
efficacy in your life and conversation. If the Spirit has written His
truth upon your heart, He will bring forth that truth in your lips
and in your life. He will make it manifest that you are "children
that cannot lie." You will show forth the power of truth, in the
sincerity of your speech, in the uprightness of your movements,
in your family, in the church, in your business, in your general
character and deportment, and in everything which stamps the
reality of religion and the power of vital godliness.

IV. I now pass on to our last point, which is the reason why His
people know Him, and the promise the Lord gives: "He dwelleth
with you, and shall be in you."
That holy Comforter and most gracious Spirit does not take up a
temporary abode in the heart of the Lord's people. Where He
once takes up His dwelling, there He for ever dwells and lives.
"He shall give you another Comforter, that He may abide with you
for ever." Oh the blessing! Where once that holy Dove has
lighted, there that Dove abides. He does not visit the soul with
His grace, and then leave it to perish under the wrath of God, or
allow His work to wither, droop and die. But where He has once
come into the soul with power, there He fixes His continual
habitation, for He makes the bodies of the saints His temple. He
consecrates them to the service of God. He takes up His dwelling
in their heart; there He lives, there He moves, there He works,
and sanctifies body and soul to the honour and glory of the Lord
God Almighty.

But I think I can almost hear you say, "I believe it to be true; but
how can He be in my heart when I am often so cold and lifeless;
when I seem to be at times so exposed to the working of every
sin, and subject to every vanity and temptation? How can this
Comforter, the Spirit of truth, dwell with me, and I be what I
am?" He may still be in you, and you may not be able, at all
times and under all circumstances, to recognise His presence. He
dwells in your heart, and yet sometimes He dwells out of sight
and almost out of life. Forget not that you have a carnal mind,
which is "enmity against God." Remember that "the flesh still
lusts against the Spirit as well as the Spirit against the flesh, and
that these two are contrary the one to the other." Believe the
Lord's Word, which cannot lie, and not the reasonings and
workings of your own unbelieving heart. Take this, then, as a
most certain truth, that He for ever abides with that soul which
He has once visited. For oh, what would be the consequences of
His deserting it? Satan would enter in to fill it with his horrid
blasphemies and wickedness, and the last state of that man
would be worse than the first. No; the indwelling of the Spirit is
needful to keep out the incoming of Satan; the indwelling of life
to keep out death; the indwelling of holiness to keep out sin; the
indwelling of the work and witness of the Holy Ghost to keep back
the waves that would deluge the soul and the billows that would
sweep it into a never-ending hell. Therefore, blessed be the word
that the Lord has spoken: "He dwelleth with you, and shall be in
you." Yes, He shall be in you; He will never leave you nor forsake
you. If He has begun His work, He will carry it on and bring it to
completion. If He has once blessed you, He will bless you again.
He will never leave the soul to which He has ever made known
the glory of God, but He will bring you, who believe in the Lord
Jesus Christ, to those glorious and blissful mansions "where tears
are wiped from off all faces," and where you will see the Son of
God as He is, be conformed to His image, and enjoy His ravishing
presence to all eternity.
The Abounding of Love in Knowledge and Experience

Preached at North Street Chapel, Stamford, on Lord's Day

Morning, Oct. 11, 1863

"And this I pray, that your love may abound yet more and more
in knowledge and in all judgment; that ye may approve things
that are excellent; that ye may be sincere and without offence till
the day of Christ; being filled with the fruits of righteousness,
which are by Jesus Christ, unto the glory and praise of God."
Philippians 1:9, 10, 11

Have you ever, in reading the Epistles of the New Testament,

observed what a spirit of prayer dwelt in the breast of Paul for the
various churches and individuals to whom he addressed his
weighty and powerful letters? And have you also remarked that
not only was it his practice to pour out his heart in continual
prayer and supplication for those churches which he had himself
planted, such as those of Corinth, Ephesus, Philippi, and
Thessalonica, and for those individuals, as Timothy and Philemon,
to whom he was personally attached, and who might be
considered his sons in the faith; but even those churches, such as
that at Rome and at Colosse, which had never seen his face in
the flesh, had as warm an interest in his Christian affection and
as large a share in his petitions to God on their spiritual behalf?
What an example for us! and it may be what a rebuke, when we
compare our poor narrow heart with the large heart of this man
of God, and our feeble and scanty petitions for the saints of the
Most High with the flow of prayer and supplication that was ever
gushing out of his breast.

But not only is there something very remarkable in the fact of

Paul's earnestness before the throne for the spiritual edification of
the churches of Christ, but the subject matter of his petitions is
as noteworthy as his prayerful spirit itself. Have you ever
examined with any degree of attention the prayers which the
apostle put up for some of the churches, and which he was not
only inspired to offer on their behalf, but to put upon permanent
record for our benefit and instruction? And have you ever
compared your petitions for your own soul's growth in grace and
in the knowledge of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ, with the
prayers which this man of God was led by the Holy Ghost to put
up for the saints to whom he wrote? But to put this point to a
closer test, I will give you three prayers of the apostle, which you
may at your leisure look over, on which you may meditate, and
which you may compare with the petitions and desires which
from time to time, in favoured moments, rise up in your own
bosom. These three prayers shall be, first, the prayer recorded at
the close of the 1st chapter of the Epistle to the Ephesians (Eph.
1:15-23); the second shall be the prayer contained toward the
end of the 3rd chapter of the same Epistle (Eph. 3:14-19); and
the third shall be the prayer we find put up by the apostle in the
1st chapter of the Epistle to the Colossians (Col. 1:9-12). My time
will not admit of even touching on, far more of entering into, the
subject matter of those prayers this morning. I wish I could do
so, as they are full to overflowing of the richest, choicest spiritual
matter; but you may consider them prayerfully and attentively at
home, and thus seek to understand, feel, and realise what the
mind of the Spirit is in them, and so be led to copy them, not in a
cold, dry, formal manner, but from the communication of divine
light and life through them to your soul.

In the words before us we have another prayer of this man of

God, but which I shall not pass by as I have passed by the
others; for it is my desire and intention this morning to lay its
rich contents open before you, according to the ability which the
Lord may give me.

You will bear in mind that the apostle is writing to the church at
Philippi, which you will recollect was a large and important city in
Macedonia, in the North of Greece, where Paul and Silas were
thrust into the inner prison and their feet made fast in the stocks,
and where there was that signal conversion of the jailer. (Acts
16:12-40.)
We come, then, now to his prayer for these Philippian saints, in
which, if I mistake not, you will find four distinct petitions; and
yet, though distinct, a blessed thread running through the whole,
connecting them together as with a ray of divine light, and thus
reflecting the grace and glory of God upon them severally and
collectively. These four petitions are

I.—First, that their "love might abound yet more and more in
knowledge and in all judgment."

II.—Secondly, that they "might approve things that are

excellent," or, as we read in the margin, "try things that differ."

III.—Thirdly, that they "might be sincere and without offence till

the day of Christ."

IV.—Fourthly, that they "might be filled with the fruits of

righteousness, which are by Jesus Christ unto the praise and
glory of God."

I.—You will observe, first the persons to whom the epistle is

written. This is of great importance, and for that reason I call
your attention to it. If you will refer to the first verse of this
chapter you will find that it is written to "all the saints in Christ
Jesus which are at Philippi, with the bishops and deacons." You
see, therefore, that this epistle, like all the other epistles in the
New Testament, was written to believers in Christ; that it was not
addressed to the world at large, to the masses of the human
race, to unbelieving Jew or unbelieving Gentile, but was specially
addressed to saints and servants of the living God. Now though
this church at Philippi has passed away, the Church of Christ has
not passed away. There are still saints in Christ Jesus, and still
Christian churches with their pastors and deacons. As, then, this
epistle is a part of the inspired Scriptures, it still speaks to
Christian churches, to believers in Christ Jesus, to the saints and
servants of God. No truth can be more simple or more obvious
than this; but how grossly has it been overlooked or perverted by
applying to the world at large the doctrines and declarations, the
promises and precepts which are the peculiar inheritance of the
believing church of God. When, then, we read this epistle from
this point of view, and see how all the promises and all the
precepts, all the instruction, reproof, or admonition contained in it
belong exclusively to the church of Christ, then we at once
perceive how every word falls into its place. To read the epistles
otherwise is something like looking through the wrong end of a
telescope; one seeing one's face in water with a ripple over the
surface; or taking a view of our features in a broken mirror, or
one which represents them upside down. In a similar way, if we
read the Epistles as if they were written to all the world, all is
distorted; we fall into the grossest mistakes, and completely
misunderstand the meaning of the Spirit.

But now observe the important conclusion which arises from this
simple and undeniable truth—that it necessarily follows that the
apostle, in the prayer in our text, assumes that those to whom he
wrote were partakers of the grace of God, and as such of that
eminent grace, love. He does not pray that they might be put into
possession of this heavenly gift and grace, as if they were
destitute of it. On the contrary, he assumes that they were
already in possession of it; for what would a saint in Christ Jesus
be without love? A monster indeed. We hear sometimes of
monsters in nature; of a lamb born with two heads, or six legs, or
two hearts. So a Christian, a real Christian, without any love to
Jesus Christ, or any love to the people of God, would be a
monster in the Church of God. Grace has many painful, many
lingering births; but the heavenly Jerusalem, which is the mother
of us all, never brought forth a monster from her teeming womb.
Does not the apostle say, "Though I speak with the tongues of
men and of angels, and have not love, I am become as sounding
brass, or a tinkling cymbal"—things without life giving sound"? (1
Cor. 13:1), and therefore without love. And does he not add,
"Though I have the gift of prophecy, and understand all
mysteries, and all knowledge; and though I have all faith, so that
I could move mountains, and have not charity, it profiteth me
nothing"? (1 Cor. 13:2.) And if "nothing," I am no Christian—a
cipher, a nonentity in the kingdom of God. If, then, there be no
love, there is no heavenly birth; but where love is, there is
regeneration and the evidence of it, according to John's
testimony: "We know that we have passed from death unto life,
because we love the brethren." (1 John 3:14.) A Christian, then,
if such a person could exist, who had neither love to the Lord
Jesus nor love to his brother would be a monster indeed—such an
one as has never yet had birth or being in the kingdom of God.

But in the case of the Philippian saints, he not merely assumed

that they were possessed of the Christian grace of love, but was
assured of it from their "fellowship with him in the gospel," that
is, their participation of the life and power, blessings and benefits
of the Gospel of Jesus Christ, and the love that they manifested
towards him. Being thus assured, then, that they were possessed
of the Christian grace of love—love to the Lord and love to his
people, for both are included here, he prays for them that this
love of theirs might abound. He could not bear the thought that it
should be diminished, that its strength and volume should be
impaired, and that it should dwindle from a flowing brook into a
slender rill, as we sometimes see in summer after a long course
of drought; still less, that it should "vanish away and be
consumed out of its place," like "the stream of brooks" that so
disappointed "the troops of Tema and the companies of Sheba."
(Job 6:15, 20.) Nor did he wish that it should continue even at
the same level, but that it should increase yet more and more,
and flow on in an increasingly bountiful and blessed course.

But he prays, and this is the point to which I shall chiefly draw
your attention, that this love "might abound yet more and more
in knowledge and in all judgment;" as if this love were like a river
which ever wants feeding with fresh supplies of pure fresh water,
to keep it ever running. A river, you know, however wide or deep,
would soon run itself out unless it were continually fed. So the
love in a Christian's breast toward the Lord Jesus Christ and his
people would soon run out, and leave nothing behind but ooze
and mud unless fresh supplies of grace were continually pouring
into it.
But the apostle expressly mentions what I may, perhaps, without
impropriety, call two main feeders of this Christian love, for as a
river cannot be sustained without feeding streams, so love in the
soul of a believer needs to be continually fed.

i. One of these feeders of Christian love named in our text is

"knowledge": "That your love may abound yet more and more in
knowledge." I shall therefore endeavour, as the Lord may enable,
to show you how "knowledge" feeds love. But before I do so, in
order to avoid all mistakes on my part and all misapprehensions
of my meaning in yours, I must, at the very outset, draw a very
important distinction between what is commonly called head
knowledge and that spiritual, heavenly knowledge of which our
text speaks. There is a knowledge of the things of God which a
man may possess without a personal experience of the new birth;
in fact, without any divine operation upon his soul whatever, or
any participation of the grace of God. From reading the scriptures
and hearing the preached Gospel, many attain to an intellectual
knowledge of the truth who, as to any experimental, vital, saving
acquaintance with it, are still in the very gall of bitterness and the
bond of iniquity. A man may have the knowledge of an apostle
and the worldliness of a Demas; be clear in head, and rotten in
heart; may talk like an angel, and live like a devil; understand all
mysteries and all knowledge, and be nothing but a hypocrite and
an impostor. (1 Cor. 13:2.) In our day such characters abound in
the churches. But distinct from this head knowledge, as distinct
from it as heaven from hell, there is a most blessed spiritual
knowledge of the things of God, with which the saints of God are
favoured; and it is of this knowledge that the apostle speaks
when he prays that their love might abound in knowledge; for
you will find that the love of a Christian always abounds in
proportion to his spiritual and experimental knowledge of the
precious things which accompany salvation.

But observe further, that eternal life itself is intimately connected

with the knowledge for which I am contending, and the nature of
which I am endeavouring to explain. Did not our blessed Lord
himself declare, "This is life eternal, that they might know thee
the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom thou hast sent?" (John
17:3.) Thus we see that eternal life itself is wrapped up in a
spiritual knowledge of God and of his dear Son. And what is one
of the leading promises of the new covenant, but that "They shall
all know me, from the least of them unto the greatest of them,
saith the Lord." (Jer. 31:34; Heb. 8:11.) It would, then, be a sad
mistake, just because a few poor deluded creatures are puffed up
with a little head knowledge, for us to overlook or despise that
gracious knowledge of the Lord himself which is life eternal.
Blessed Lord, may it be our increasing desire to know thee more
and more by thine own gracious manifestations to our soul!
Wasn't this Paul's longing? "That I may know him, and the power
of his resurrection, and the fellowship of his sufferings, being
made conformable unto his death." (Phil. 3:10.)

But again, if we look at the subject a little more closely, we shall

see how every grace of the Spirit is fed by knowledge. Look, for
instance, at faith. Is it not, as Hart says?

"Faith is by knowledge fed,

And with obedience mixed."

If we have no knowledge of the Lord, how can we believe in him

unto life eternal? Faith is the substance of things hoped for, the
evidence of things not seen. (Heb. 11:1.) But how can I hope in
things of which I know nothing, or have an evidence of the
unseen realities of eternity if I am completely ignorant of them?
This was not the faith of Abel who offered a more excellent
sacrifice than Cain, for he knew a more acceptable way; nor of
Enoch, who walked with God; nor of any of the ancient worthies
who "saw the promises afar off, and were persuaded of them,
and embraced them." Does not Paul say, "I know whom I have
believed?" (2 Tim. 1:12.) If, then, I know not the things that faith
brings into my heart, how can I be said really and truly to believe
in them?
So with hope. A good hope through grace is fed by knowledge,
for as faith regards the present, so hope regards the future.
Abraham believed God's promise, and against hope believed in
hope of its fulfilment. (Rom. 4:18.) But his hope as well as his
faith was founded in his knowledge of God's faithfulness. So how
can I hope in that which I know not? If I know not Christ, how
can I hope in him? If I know not his grace, how hope in it? If I
know not his love, how take anchor in it? for if my anchor is
entered into that within the veil, I must know something of him
who ever sitteth there.

But love is especially the effect of knowledge; for our love,

according to our text, is to abound yet more and more in
knowledge. Love, we know, is a fruit of the blessed Spirit. As then
the Lord the Spirit is pleased to open up the precious truth of God
to the soul, love embraces what the Holy Ghost reveals. Thus
there is a knowledge of the only true God by the teaching of the
Spirit. By this teaching he reveals himself to the soul; sheds
abroad his love in the heart; brings his mercy near; discovers his
grace; unfolds his faithfulness; shines forth gloriously in the
Person and work of his dear Son, and thus makes himself
effectually and experimentally known "from the least to the
greatest" of them. (Jer. 31:31.) And the more we know him, the
more we shall love him, for he himself is love, and to love him is
but a reflection of his own image.

So with respect to our blessed Lord. The more we know him the
more we shall love him. The more we know of his glorious Person
as Immanuel, God with us, the more we shall love him as a
suitable and all-sufficient Mediator; the more we know of his
atoning blood as revealed to, and sprinkled upon a guilty
conscience, the more we shall love him as having shed that
precious blood to redeem us from the lowest hell; the more we
know of his righteousness, the more we shall see how adapted it
is to our needy, naked condition, and the more we shall love him
for having suffered in our place and stead; the more we know of
his dying love, the more we shall love him for the display of that
love. Does not the apostle pray that we "may be able to
comprehend with all saints what is the breadth, and length, and
depth, and height, and to know the love of Christ which passeth
knowledge?" (Eph. 3:18, 19)
But I may add that the more we know also of ourselves, of our
desperate case, of our ruined condition, of our miserable state as
poor lost sinners; the more we know of the evils of our heart and
what we deserve as having broken God's holy law, and as having
so continually backslidden from him; and the more we see his
forbearance and long-suffering, his loving-kindness and tender
pity to us, in spite of all our base deserts and shameful requitals,
the more we shall see in him to love. The more, too, we know of
his grace, the more we shall value it; and the more we know of
his glory, the more we shall fall in love with it. Thus as these
precious things are opened up more and more clearly to our
spiritual understanding, and sealed more powerfully by a divine
witness upon our heart, the more warmly are they embraced in
love, and the more is the soul conformed to the divine image; for
"the new man is renewed in knowledge after the image of him
that created him" (Col. 3:10); and "we all, with open face
beholding as in a glass the glory of the Lord, are changed into the
same image from glory to glory, even as by the Spirit of the
Lord." (2 Cor. 3:18.) To behold this glory is the very blessedness
of the gospel, and the choicest treasure which God can bestow:
"For God, who commanded the light to shine out of darkness,
hath shined in our hearts, to give the light of the knowledge of
the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ." (2 Cor. 4:6.)
And as we love the Lord we shall love his people; for "every one
that loveth him that begat, loveth him also that is begotten of
him." (1 John 5:1.) Let us not, then, deceive ourselves. Where
there is love to Jesus, there will be love to those who are his by
redemption, his by regeneration, and his by personal possession.
The more, too, that we see and the more that we know of the
beauty and blessedness of the Lord of life and glory, the more we
shall love his image as we behold it visibly marked in his dear
people, and the more we shall cleave to them as being Christ's
with tender affection. It is our dim, scanty, and imperfect
knowledge of God the Father in his eternal love, and of the Lord
Jesus Christ in his grace and glory, which leaves us so often cold,
lifeless, and dead in our affections towards him; and with the
declension of love towards the Head comes on decay of love
towards his members. If there were more blessed revelations to
our soul of the Person and work, grace and glory, beauty and
blessedness of the Lord Jesus Christ, it is impossible but that we
should more and more warmly and tenderly fall in love with him;
for he is the most glorious Object that the eyes of faith can see.
He fills heaven with the resplendent beams of his glorious
Majesty; and has ravished the hearts of thousands of his dear
family upon earth by the manifestations of his bleeding, dying
love. So that if we love him not, it is because we know him not.
If, then, to those who know him he makes himself precious, it is
evident that just in proportion to our personal, spiritual,
experimental knowledge of him will be our love to him.

ii. But the apostle tells us of another feeder, if I may use the
expression, of this divine love; and that is "judgment," or, as the
word properly means, "feeling." I shall adopt, therefore, the
marginal reading, as giving not only the more literal but a more
scriptural and experimental meaning than that in the text. It is
there rendered "sense," that is, perception or feeling, or, to use a
more comprehensive word, "experience." Thus our love is to
abound not only in knowledge, which is the foundation of it,
because, as I have already shown, if there is no knowledge of the
Lord there can be no love to the Lord or his people, but also "in
all feeling," in all sense, in all experience. Spiritual knowledge,
therefore, and experimental feeling are the two feeders of
Christian love; the two streams, as it were, that run side by side
out of the very throne of the Most High, and meet and melt into
that boundless river, love. It is, therefore, by this union of
knowledge and experience, of divine light and heavenly life, of
the Spirit's teaching and the Spirit's testimony, of truth in the
understanding and of feeling in the affections, that love is
maintained in the soul, and flows out towards the Lord and his
people. Do you not see, therefore, now still more plainly how the
spiritual knowledge for which I am contending differs so widely
from that carnal, intellectual, barren head knowledge which I was
condemning? The one is a flowing river, the other a stagnant
pool; the one fertilises the heart, and makes it fruitful in every
good word and work; the other leaves it a barren swamp, in
which creeps and crawls every hideous thing, and out of which
ever rise miasma, disease, and death. See also how the union of
knowledge and experience as sustaining love distinguishes the
work of the Spirit from every imitation of it. Where there is the
true work of the Spirit, there will be gracious knowledge and
experimental feeling. You may have feeling without knowledge—
that is wrong; you may have knowledge without feeling—and that
is wrong. Feeling, as mere feeling, is no certain mark of real
religion. Have the Catholics no feeling when they kiss and weep
over their crucifix? Had the Jewish women no feeling who "sat
weeping for Tammuz"—their beautiful god Adonis, whose
untimely fate they thus mourned? (Ezek. 8:14.) Have Arminians
no feeling when they are, as they say, "shaken over hell" one half
hour, and burst forth into shouts of "Glory, glory," the next?
What! no feeling in natural religion! Why, in feeling is much of its
very life blood. To be melted by a funeral sermon is to some what
being melted by a tragedy is to others; and the pulpit has its
accomplished actors to stir the passions as well as the playhouse.
Thus we see that feeling, as feeling, is no sure test of grace; for
there are natural feelings in religion as well as spiritual—the
repentance of Ahab as well as the repentance of Peter, the joy of
the stony ground hearers as well as "joy in the Holy Ghost." But
these feelings are worthless, nay worse, as being awfully
delusive, when they have no foundation in grace or the true
knowledge of God.

But now let me show you what is the experience, or, as the
apostle calls it, "sense," which feeds and maintains the grace of
love. To explain this more clearly, let me observe that there is a
kind of analogy or resemblance between spiritual feeling and
natural feeling, spiritual sense and natural sense, and this in a
variety of ways.

1. There is first, then, a spiritual sight given to us at regeneration

which is analogous to our natural sight. How full the Scriptures
are of this new spiritual sense—this believing eye. "For
judgment," said our gracious Lord, "I am come into this world,
that they which see not might see." (John 9:39.) Paul was sent to
the Gentiles "to open their eyes" (Acts 26:18), according to the
prophecy, "Then the eyes of the blind shall be opened." (Isai.
35:5.) So Paul prays, "The eyes of your understanding being
enlightened." (Eph. 1:18.) But I need not multiply passages to
prove what is so plain. Now just see what an inlet the eye is, not
only to knowledge but to feeling. If we see some object to move
our pity, how instantaneously the heart feels what the eye
conveys. Love, we know, chiefly enters through the eye, and is so
fed by sight that absence from the beloved object is almost its
only cure. So in a spiritual sense, divine love enters through the
eye, and is fed by repeated sight of the beloved Object. In this
way we learn first to love our blessed Lord. It is now as in days of
old, as John testified: "And the light shineth in darkness; and the
darkness comprehended it not." (John 1:5.) The light is still
shining, but the darkness of men's natural minds comprehendeth,
or receiveth it not. Why? Because "their minds are blinded." (2
Cor. 3:14.) But now see the difference in those that are "born of
God." "And the Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us, (and
we beheld his glory, the glory of the only begotten of the Father),
full of grace and truth." (John 1:14.) Why did they behold his
glory? Because the Lord had given them sight, and thus revealed
himself to their believing eyes. And by those who believe, Jesus is
still to be seen, for "by faith we see him who is invisible." (Heb.
11:27.) This was beautifully unfolded by the Lord himself to his
sorrowing disciples: "I will not leave you comfortless: I will come
to you. Yet a little while, and the world seeth me no more; but ye
see me: because I live, ye shall live also." (John 14:18, 19.) And
again, "He that hath my commandments, and keepeth them, he it
is that loveth me: and he that loveth me shall be loved of my
Father, and I will love him, and will manifest myself to him."
(John 14:21.) Thus we see that it is by the manifestations of the
Lord to the soul that he is seen and loved. And does not love,
therefore, abound in proportion to the sense of sight, for the
more he is seen the more he must be loved?

2. But again, there is in grace as well as in nature a spiritual ear.

What an inlet is hearing to the acquisition of all natural
knowledge. Look, for instance, at those who are born, as it is
called, deaf and dumb. They are not really dumb, though called
so, for all their vocal organs are as perfect as ours. But they
cannot use them so as to form intelligible language, for no sound
has ever reached their mind; and what they have never heard
they cannot imitate. We have our deaf-mutes in the religious as
well as the natural world, who cannot speak the language of
Canaan, for they have never heard it spoken into their heart; and
we have those once deaf who now hear, and that by the power of
an Almighty "Ephphatha." (Mark 7:34.) Thus there is a spiritual
sense of hearing analogous to the natural sense of hearing. And
does not Scripture confirm this? "As soon as they hear of me,
they shall obey me." (Psa. 18:44.) "Hear, and your soul shall
live." (Isa. 55:3.) "Faith cometh by hearing, and hearing by the
word of God." (Rom. 10:17). As, too, the ear is an inlet of
knowledge, so it is an awakener of feeling. If we hear any glad
tidings, how the heart leaps for joy; if we hear any gloomy
tidings, how the heart sinks in sorrow. So when the Lord speaks a
word of reproof, the heart sinks in grief; when he gives a word of
encouragement, it leaps with exultation. "My sheep," says Jesus,
"hear my voice." (John 10:27.) But what feeds love more than
the accents of his voice? How he speaks in the promises, the
invitations, the exhortations, and the precepts of the Gospel; and
how every word that he speaks is precious, for, as the Spouse
says, "His mouth is most sweet;" and again, "It is the voice of my
beloved" (Song 5:2-16); and once more: "Thou that dwellest in
the gardens, the companions hearken to thy voice: cause me to
hear it." (Song 8:13.) But what would that voice be to kindle and
maintain love if there were no ear to hear it? How musical are the
accents of those we love! How often they linger in the memory as
melancholy echoes of the past!

3. In a similar way a spiritual taste is analogous to the natural

taste. "If so be ye have tasted that the Lord is gracious" (1 Pet.
2:3); "O taste and see that the Lord is good" (Psa. 34:3); "How
sweet are thy words to my taste," yea, "sweeter than honey and
the honeycomb." (Psa. 119:103; 19:10.) There is a tasting of the
milk and honey of the gospel, and it is by tasting the sweetness
of this milk and honey that we know its preciousness. What would
even our natural food be if there were no taste? But how savoury
it becomes when taste comes in to share the feast as well as
appetite for the food. Be hungry for the bread of life; be amongst
those whom our Lord has pronounced blessed as hungering and
thirsting after righteousness, then how sweet the bread; how
precious the milk; how savoury the meat spread on the Gospel
table! Then we can respond to the Lord's gracious invitation:
"Eat, O friends; drink, yea, drink abundantly, O beloved." (Song
5:1.) Does not, then, a spiritual taste feed love both to the
banquet and to the Lord of the banquet? Be assured that the
reason why the word of God is often so tasteless, is because we
have either no appetite or a depraved one.

4. But again, there is a spiritual handling analogous to the natural

sense of touch. This, we know, is eminently the sense of feeling,
as distinguished from the other senses. How do we naturally
know whether objects are hot or cold? By the sense of touch. So
it is in grace: there is a handling of the Word of life, as John
speaks in that remarkable passage, where he mentions in the
compass of one verse three of the spiritual senses which I am
seeking to explain. "That which was from the beginning, which we
have heard, which we have seen with our eyes, which we have
looked upon, and our hands have handled of the Word of life." So
the Lord said to his disciples, "Handle me and see" (Luke 24:39);
and still invites us by the prophet, "Or let him take hold of my
strength, that he may make peace with me; and he shall make
peace with me." (Isa. 27:5.) Did not the woman with the issue of
blood touch the hem of Jesus's garment, and was she not at once
made whole? So "the whole multitude sought to touch him, for
there went virtue out of him and healed them all." (Luke 8:47;
6:19.) Does not embracing feed love? How the fond mother
embraces her babe! After a long absence how lovers embrace
each other; and how every embrace renews affection! How the
women at the sepulchre "held Jesus by the feet," as if they could
not, would not let him go! And so says the Bride: "I held him and
would not let him go until I had brought him into my mother's
house." (Song 3:4.) Truly here is feeling, and love abounding in
feeling in every sense of the word.
5. Again, there is the spiritual smell, for as all the senses have
their analogy in grace, there is the spiritual smell to correspond
with the natural organ. Do we not read: "Because of the savour
of thy good ointments, thy name is an ointment poured forth;
therefore do the virgins love thee." (Song 1:3.) But how could the
virgins smell the savour of his good ointments, unless they had a
spiritual nose? Isaac knew something of this spiritual sense when
he said "See, the smell of my son is as the smell of a field which
the Lord hath blessed." (Gen. 27:27.) Is it not said also of our
gracious Lord? "All thy garments smell of myrrh, aloes, and
cassia" (Psal. 45:8); and when he gave himself for us it was "an
offering and a sacrifice to God for a sweet-smelling savour." (Eph.
5:2.) But how can we smell the sweet-smelling myrrh that drops
from his lips if we have no spiritual smell? (Song 5:13.)

Thus we see how all these spiritual senses—sight, hearing,

tasting, feeling, and smelling feed love; and therefore the apostle
prays that it may abound yet more and more, not in knowledge
only, but in all those spiritual senses which are exercised to
discern both good and evil. If I see the Lord, I shall love him; if I
hear the Lord, I shall love him; if I taste the Lord, I shall love
him; if I feel the Lord, I shall love him; if I smell the good
ointments of the Lord, I shall love him; and that in proportion to
the keenness of my sight, my hearing, my taste, my touch, and
my smell.

This, then, is the peculiar blessedness of living experience, that it

goes hand in hand with gracious knowledge to sustain heavenly
love; and that Christ is the end and Object of both; the end and
Object of all saving knowledge, and the end and Object of all true
experience; for in this as in every thing else, he is the Alpha and
Omega, the beginning and the end, the first and the last.

II.—But I pass on to consider the next petition of the apostle for

his Philippian brethren, which indeed is closely connected with
that already handled: "That ye may approve things that are
excellent," or, as the margin reads, "try thing that differ."
I shall adopt both readings, and take the latter first. "That ye
may try things that differ."

i. A Christian in walking through this world has many things upon

which he is continually called to exercise his spiritual judgment.
He is not to be led blindfold by others, even by his best friends or
most trustworthy counsellors; nor must he trust to himself for
wisdom and direction; still less must he be altogether heedless of
the steps that he takes. Sin and Satan are continually laying
snares for his feet; and therefore he is to walk circumspectly and
cautiously lest he be entangled in them. He will find too that the
more he desires to walk in the fear of the Lord, the more will a
great variety of cases ever come before his mind, of which,
unless he try them, he cannot ascertain the real worth or value.
Now these ever-varying circumstances are spoken of in the
margin "as things that differ."

Sometimes we have to try our own experience. We know that

there is a false experience; a natural faith, a delusive hope, and a
pretended love; for we see an abundance of these deceptions
everywhere around us. We have, then, to try our own faith, hope,
and love to see if they be genuine. Does my experience bear
marks of a divine character? Is my faith the gift of God? Is my
hope a good hope through grace? Is my love the fruit of the
Spirit, or sparks of my own kindling? Do I love in word or in
tongue, or in deed and in truth? What has the Lord
communicated to my soul? Does my religion bear marks and
evidences of being the fruit of his own grace? This is trying things
that differ, for we know what a wide difference there is between a
true experience and a false one.

Again, my motives at different times greatly differ: they are then

to be tried. Some motives are good, others bad; some natural,
others spiritual: some will bear the light, others will not. I must
try my motives, then, for the value of actions depends almost
wholly on their secret springs.
My words, too. As a preacher, I must try my words, whether they
are like Naphtali's, "goodly words" (Gen. 49:21); whether they
are consistent with the truth revealed in the word: whether they
are agreeable to the experience of God's saints. So our words in
private; we have to try them over. Were they spoken in the fear
of the Lord? Were they light and trifling, or words of gravity,
sobriety, and consistency?

So our thoughts: we have to try them, whether they are evil or

good, carnal or spiritual, gracious or ungodly.

So our spirit: for we must try our own spirit as well as that of
others. Is it the spirit of a Christian, or the spirit of the world? Is
it a meek spirit or a proud spirit? a godly spirit or an ungodly
spirit? a forgiving spirit or an unforgiving spirit? a becoming spirit
or an unbecoming spirit? We have to try our spirits n this way, or
we shall make sad mistakes, perhaps disgrace our Christian
profession, or wound our own conscience and the conscience of
others. I cannot do with a reckless Antinomian spirit, or that spirit
of levity and frivolity, hardness and audacity, which in our day
passes off both in pulpit and pew for strong assurance, but which
I call strong delusion or daring presumption.

In a similar manner we have to try our ways generally, whether

they are consistent with the gospel; whether our life, conduct,
and conversation become our profession, and whether we are
living to the glory of God. It is awful work to be so blinded and
hardened by the devil, as never to weigh up matters how they
stand in the sight of God, the great Searcher of hearts. But what
is our standard, for we must have one to judge righteous
judgment? We have two: the one is the infallible word of God
which tries all things, and must be the grand court of appeal; the
other is our own experience; the dealings of God with our soul,
the teachings of God in our own breast. And by these two
things—the word of God externally, and the life of God internally,
we have to "try things that differ." Now if our words and works,
spirit and conduct, will not bear these two tests, they are
unsound; and how then will they stand the heart-searching eye of
him with whom we have to do?

But now see the connection between this and the first petition. As
our love abounds in knowledge and all sense, we are put into a
position to try things that differ; for love is very keen sighted.
What sharp eyes it has! How it reads people's faces; how it
interprets looks; what significations it puts upon little actions;
and how quick-sighted to gather information from a glance of the
eye or a curl of the lip. And love has something very tender and
feeling about it. There must be feeling where there is love, for as
it is a passion that takes such entire possession of the breast, and
is so very sensitive, it is anxious to try what makes for or against
it. So it is in divine love. It will take and weigh matters as God
would have them weighed by trying things that differ; for love's
keen eyes will soon see what God approves of, and what he
disapproves. Now as this spiritual judgment is exercised, there
will follow upon the decision which love gives an "approving of
things that are excellent."

ii. This necessarily follows upon trying things that differ, and
coming to a right decision upon them; for both an enlightened
judgment and a loving heart concur in this approval. When, then,
we have tried contending circumstances in these two balances,
then we cannot only stamp upon that which is good the mark of
excellence, but can seal it as such with our loving approval. There
is a seeing the light and hating it, as Milton represents Satan
telling the Sun how he hated his beams; and there are those of
whom we read that "they rebel against the light." (Job 24:13.)
But love approves of all that shines in the light of God's
testimony. Whatever God has revealed in the word, whatever he
has planted by his own hand in the soul, bears the stamp of its
great Author. As, then, we are favoured with spiritual knowledge,
and blessed with spiritual sense, we approve things that are
excellent because they are of God. There is no mark of depravity
greater than putting good for evil and evil for good, bitter for
sweet and sweet for bitter. It is the last issue of human
wickedness, first to confound good and evil, and then deliberately
prefer the latter. This was the climax of the sins of the Gentile
world, that "knowing the judgment of God, that they who commit
such things are worthy of death, not only do the same, but have
pleasure in them that do them." As distinct, then, from these
awful characters the saint of God will approve things that are
excellent. Let us see some of these excellent things of which he
deliberately approves.
1. The love of God in the gift of his dear Son, is the most
excellent of all his adorable attributes in the estimation of love.
"How excellent is thy loving kindness, O God," said one of old.
(Psa. 36:7.)

2. Nor less excellent is the grace of love in the heart which flows
from the manifestation of the loving kindness of God. The
apostle, therefore, says to the Corinthians: "And yet I show unto
you a more excellent way"—the way of "charity," or love. (1 Cor.
12:31.)

3. Grace in its sovereignty, fulness, blessedness, and

superaboundings over the aboundings of sin, is so excellent in
itself as glorious to God, and so excellent to us as suitable to
man, and adapted to every want and woe of the sinner, that it is
worthy of our warmest approval. But when shall I really approve
of the excellency of gospel grace? When I know it, and when I
feel it; for then my love will abound in knowledge and in all
sense. Then I really understand its blessedness; then I not only
feel its sweetness, but I try the things that differ, salvation by
grace and salvation by works. I see the excellency of the former;
I see the delusion of the latter, and I approve of that which is
excellent.

4. By the same "knowledge" and the same "sense," I look at the

saints of God, and I find them to be what the Lord has himself
pronounced them, "the excellent of the earth." (Psa. 16:2, 3.) But
how few there are who really approve of the saints of God, as the
excellent of the earth, or believe them to be what the Lord calls
them, "the salt of the earth" (Matt. 5:3), to preserve it from
putrefaction, and "the pillars of the earth," upon which the Lord
"hath set the world," that it might not fall into ruin. (1 Sam. 2:8.)
Instead of approving of and delighting in them, how most
despise, hate, and persecute them. And why? Because their eyes
are not illuminated by a ray of divine light to see their excellency,
nor their hearts touched by divine grace to love it. For what is
their excellency? Not in the creature: there is no excellency there.
But this is their excellency, that they have the mind and image of
Christ. This is their excellency, that Jesus is seen in them. We
have seen the excellency of Jesus; we have admired his beauty,
fallen in love with his grace, and been delighted with his glory.
Now when we see the image of Jesus reflected in the hearts of his
people, we must approve of it as well as love it because it
resembles him. When you see a real Christian, one who is meek
and humble, tender, broken, and contrite, with a heart full of
faith, hope, and love, walking in the fear of God; desirous to
know his will and do it; submissive under affliction; spiritually
minded, and adorning the doctrine by a godly life, don't you
approve of that man as one of the excellent of the earth? And
when you see a man in a profession of religion proud and
obstinate, worldly and covetous, boasting and presumptuous, full
of self-exaltation and self-conceit, light and trifling, carnal and
earthly minded, in adversity unsubmissive to the will of God, in
prosperity determined to have his own will and way, don't you
disapprove of that man and what you see in him, as being
contrary to the mind of Christ and the image of the suffering Son
of God? It must be so, if you have a right understanding of the
things of God. If divine light has enlightened your mind, divine
life quickened your heart, and you love the Lord and his people,
you must approve of the things that are excellent. For they are so
commended to your conscience that you can no more do
otherwise than you can tell a deliberate lie, or call black white.
And as you approve of them, you will disapprove of every thing
which is contrary to, or falls short of this excellency. Now this is
what distinguishes us from the world and the spirit of it and from
all whose eyes are blinded by the god of this world—that whilst
they approve of the things God abhors, we approve of the things
that God loves. Here is the mind of Christ; here is the teaching of
the Spirit giving us in some measure to see as Christ sees, to feel
as Christ feels, to love as Christ loves, and to approve as Christ
approves. We shall never go far wrong so long as we are
approving the things that are excellent, and seeking, as the Lord
may enable, to know the will of God and do it. But directly that
we lose sight of this spiritual standard and set up the opinion of
men, then our eyes get blinded, our hearts hardened, our
consciences benumbed, and instead of approving the things that
are excellent, we may gradually and insensibly drift into the very
spirit of ungodliness.

III.—But now comes our next and third petition, "that ye may be
sincere and without offence till the day of Christ." Sincerity is the
very life-breath of a Christian. If he is not sincere, he is nothing. I
was speaking just now of a monster in Christianity, and I said
that a Christian without love was a monster indeed. But I may go
farther, and say that a Christian without sincerity could not exist.

i. But what kind of sincerity does our text mean? A man may be
sincere, that is naturally sincere, and yet be altogether out of the
secret of divine teaching. Was not Paul sincere when he went to
Damascus, breathing threatenings and slaughter against the
saints of God? But he was sincerely wrong. The only sincerity
worth the name is what the apostle calls "godly sincerity" (2
Cor.1:12), that is, a sincerity wrought in the heart by the power
of God. The original word in our text is very striking: it signifies a
sincerity which may be judged or examined by the light of the
sun, as distinguished from that insincerity and deceitfulness
which, like the bat and the owl, creep into the dark corners.
Christian sincerity will bear the light of the sun, and in fact it is a
ray out of the Sun of righteousness which creates it. A man
cannot be really and truly sincere in the sight of God who has not
divine life in his breast. It is the light of life in his soul that makes
him sincere in a spiritual sense before God.

But now see the connection of this petition with the preceding. So
far as we are sincere, we shall try things that differ and approve
things that are excellent. We shall be able to bring our religion
out to the test, as we hold up a piece of cloth to the light that the
sun may shine upon it and show us if there are any moth-holes,
any thin, worn-out places, any fraudulent material. This is not like
keeping damaged goods in the back shop; or drawing customers
into some dark corner of the counter to pass Yorkshire shoddy off
for West of England broadcloth. We should be able to bring our
religion out of our heart in all its length and breadth, and hold it
up to the beams of the sun to see ourselves and let others see
too whether the material of which it is made be sound or rotten.
It may have a very good surface, be nicely smoothed over, and
yet the material be as rotten as Jeremiah's "old cast clouts," or
the worn-out clothes of the Gibeonites. (Jer. 38:2; Josh.9:5.) O,
to be truly sincere and have the heart made honest in the fear of
God, that we may appeal to him, "Thou God seest me," and with
the Psalmist, "O Lord, thou hast searched me and known me."
(Gen. 16:13; Psa. 139:1.) This religion will stand the light, as our
gracious Lord said: "For every one that doeth evil hateth the
light, neither cometh to the light, lest his deeds should be
reproved. But he that doeth truth cometh to the light, that his
deeds may be made manifest that they are wrought in God."
(John 3:20, 21.)

ii. But the apostle adds, "and without offence till the day of
Christ." The word means literally to cause any to stumble over
our crooked ways, words, or works, and thus conceive a prejudice
against the religion we profess. It is a sad thing to put a
stumbling-block in the way of any person, especially an inquirer
after truth, or open the mouth of an enemy. There was an
express prohibition in the Levitical law against putting a
stumbling-block in the way of the blind. (Lev. 19:14.) And O what
a solemn thing it is for a Christian so to act as to put a stumbling-
block before those who are naturally blinded by prejudice against
the doctrines of grace. Our blessed Lord pronounced against such
a solemn woe: "Woe unto the world because of offences! for it
must needs be that offences come; but woe to that man by whom
the offence cometh!" (Matt. 18:7.) The desire, therefore, of the
Christian is to be "without offence," that is, without causing any
justly to stumble at his words, ways, or work; but to live before
God and man with that uprightness, tenderness, consistency, and
general conduct becoming the gospel, that none shall take real
cause of offence against the truth of God by seeing in him
practice unworthy of his profession. We shall not indeed be able
to avoid giving offence in the usual sense of the word, for nothing
is more offensive to the world than vital godliness; and the Lord
warned us that we should be hated of all men for his name's
sake. But the meaning of the word is not to give legitimate cause
of offence so as to stumble sinners or stumble saints, and bring a
reproach upon our holy religion by words or works unbecoming
our Christian profession; and that "until the day of Christ," when
the thoughts of all hearts shall be revealed. When I am gone I
hope that no one when he sees my tomb in the Cemetery may be
able to kick his foot against my gravestone, and say, "Here lies a
drunkard; here lies an Antinomian; here lies a covetous wretch; a
bad husband, a bad father, and a treacherous friend; a pretended
minister, who preached one thing and practised another, and
disgraced instead of adorning his profession of the Gospel."

IV.—The last petition, on which I must be very brief, falls in well

with the three preceding: "Being filled with the fruits of
righteousness, which are by Jesus Christ, unto the glory and
praise of God."
The apostle desired that they might be trees well loaded with
Gospel fruit. You will bear in mind that it was a prayer for them;
he does not say that they were thus abundantly fruitful; but it
was his desire that they might be. As a gardener, when he walks
in his garden in the autumn and looks at his trees, examines
them chiefly with a view to their fruit; and if among them he sees
one with scarcely any crop, says, with a sigh, "Ah, how few pears
or plums there are this year upon this tree of mine!" But if he
pass on to the next and see it well loaded, it gladdens his heart.
So to go into the garden of the Church and see on one tree only
two or three berries upon the top of the uppermost bough, on
another mildewed leaves or withered branches, and only a
wizened plum or a half-ripe pear here and there—this is not a
pleasant sight to the spiritual gardener. But to see the trees of
the Lord's own planting "filled with the fruits of righteousness,"
and every grace and fruit of the Spirit brought forth into a
blessed exercise—this is a sight indeed to cheer and comfort his
heart. This is the sight the apostle longed to have his eyes
gladdened with, that when he came again to Philippi to visit the
church planted there by his instrumentality, he might see all the
members with the elders and deacons filled with the fruits of
righteousness—internal, such as love, joy, peace, longsuffering,
gentleness, meekness, and every external fruit of the Spirit
adorning their life and conversation. He would gladly see their
leaf fresh and verdant, their stem healthy and strong, their
branches free from blight or mildew, and a blessed crop loading
every bough. And all this he knew would be "by Jesus Christ," by
his presence and power, his Spirit and grace, and all would
redound "unto the glory and praise of God;" as the Lord himself
said, "Herein is my Father glorified, that ye bear much fruit; so
shall ye be my disciples." (John 15:8.)

Now can we find anything in our soul corresponding with the

desires thus beautifully expressed for the Philippian Church by
the pen of the man of God? But bear in mind that the Philippians
were not necessarily all the apostle prayed they might be. Grace,
indeed, could make them so; and as far as they were under its
power and influence, their desires for themselves would be the
same as those here expressed for them. But can you join heart
and hand with these earnest petitions, and first, from the bottom
of your heart, desire your love to abound more and more in
divine knowledge and gracious experience? This will form a solid
foundation for the other petitions, and for an earnest request to
the Lord of all grace that he would drop every one of these rich
blessings into your soul. Then you certainly have already the
fulfilment of the second petition, if not of all the rest; for you
"approve things that are excellent." If you seem to fall short, and
we all fall short of being "filled with the fruits of righteousness,"
yet so far as we are Christians at all, there is a being "sincere,"
and a desire to give no just cause of offence to friend or foe. At
any rate, we feel that there is no wilful turning away the ear, nor
hardening the heart, nor stifling the conscience against the power
of the word. These things may encourage us still to present our
petitions before the throne, ever bearing in mind that the Lord is
able to do exceeding abundantly above all that we ask or think,
and by granting our desires and manifesting himself to our souls,
can even in this time state fill us with joy unspeakable and full of
glory.
AN ACCEPTABLE PRESENT TO THE LORD OF HOSTS

Preached at Eden Street Chapel, Hampstead Road, London, in

1843

"In that time shall the present be brought unto the Lord of Hosts
of a people scattered and peeled, and from a people terrible from
their beginning hitherto: a nation meted out and trodden under
foot, whose land the rivers have spoiled, to the place of the name
of the Lord of Hosts, the Mount Zion." Isa 18:7

When presents are made to earthly monarchs, they are almost

always of a costly and valuable nature. In fact, it would seem an
insult to offer to an earthly monarch any present that did not, in
some degree, correspond to the exalted situation, which he
occupies. But "Gods thoughts are not our thoughts, neither are
our ways his ways. For as the heavens are higher than the earth,
so are his ways higher than our ways, and his thoughts than our
thoughts" (Isa. 55:8, 9)

"The present" that is "brought unto the Lord of Hosts," spoken of

in the text, is of a very different character from what is usually
offered to earthly sovereigns. A nation flourishing in arts and
arms, occupying a fertile and extensive territory, carrying on a
wide and lucrative commerce, and sending its fleets and armies
all over the globe—such a people might well be a present
acceptable to an earthly monarch. But when we look at the text,
and see what sort of people is presented to the Lord of Hosts, we
find a nation of a very different character brought unto him. We
read there of a people "scattered and peeled," of a nation "meted
out and trodden under foot, whose land the rivers have spoiled;"
and that this broken, and, as they might naturally be called,
useless people, are brought "to the place of the name of the Lord
of Hosts, the Mount Zion," as an acceptable offering to him who
lives and reigns there.
Now, reason would dictate, and, indeed, it is the prevalent
religion of the day, that an offering, which is to be made to the
Lord of Hosts, should be such a one as agrees with his holy and
righteous character. We find, therefore, the generality of
ministers exhorting everybody to give to the Lord the prime of
their life, their strongest affections, their noblest mental and
bodily faculties, with all the piety, zeal, diligence, and holiness
that they can muster, and to lay them down at the feet of the
Lord of Hosts as an offering acceptable in his sight. And though
this never is done, and, from the utterly fallen state of man,
never can be done, we find the preachers no less constantly
exhorting, and the people no less perpetually approving of this as
the only excellent way.

But when we look at the text (and we must adhere to the

word of God, however contrary to our carnal reason) we
find that "the present which is to be brought to the Lord of
Hosts," is not of a righteous people, a people zealous, and
diligent, a people active in good words and works, "but people
scattered and peeled, and from a people terrible from their
beginning hitherto; a nation meted out and trodden under foot,
whose land the rivers have spoiled, to the place of the name of
the Lord of Hosts, the Mount Zion." Without further preface then,
I shall, from these words, endeavour, with Gods blessing, to
describe what the character, the experimental character I mean,
of that people is which is "brought as a present unto the Lord of
Hosts."

But we must bear in mind that the people of God are always to be
looked at in two points of view. First, as standing in the Son of
God, their eternal Covenant Head; and, secondly, as standing in
Adam, their temporal covenant head. Viewed in Christ, they stand
accepted in him "without spot or blemish, or any such thing." The
church, as an unspotted, lovely bride, was betrothed unto Christ
in eternity before ever she fell in Adam. Thus in this sense
therefore, the church, as the spotless wife of the Lamb, is a
present fit for the Lord of Hosts, for she stands righteous in
Christs righteousness, holy in Christs holiness, comely in Christs
comeliness, and perfect in Christs perfection. But, viewed in fallen
Adam, as a partaker of his depraved nature, and viewed
experimentally when brought to know the plague of her heart,
she stands "full of wounds, and bruises, and putrefying sores."

The people spoken of in the text, as presented to the Lord of

Hosts, correspond to the church in this latter point of view. We
will, therefore, with Gods blessing, examine in detail the
description here given of them; and I think we shall find six
distinct marks stamped upon them by the blessed Spirit. These
six marks are, that they are "scattered," "peeled," "terrible,"
"meted out," "trodden under foot," and their land one which "the
rivers have spoiled." Every one of these striking epithets
deserves, and, therefore, demands a distinct and separate
examination.

The Holy Ghost, then, has stamped the people of God in the text
with these peculiar marks; for I do not consider that,
experimentally viewed, a particular section, a distinct part of
Gods people, are here intended, as though some experience were
described in the text which a few only of the living family are
acquainted with. But I view the text as descriptive of all the
family of God, and that the marks stamped upon them here are
such as are universally affixed to all the manifested election of
grace.

I. The first mark stamped upon the people of God is that they are
a "scattered" people. Considered even locally, as far as their
earthly habitations are concerned, we find this "scattered"
condition of Gods people to be a matter of fact, a thing of daily
and universal experience. Wherever we go we find that the
people of God are a scattered family. It was so in times of old.
The church at Jerusalem was speedily "scattered" abroad
throughout the regions of Judaea and Samaria (Acts 8:1). James
writes "to the twelve tribes which are scattered abroad" (James
1:1); and Peter to "the strangers scattered throughout Pontus..."
(1Peter 1:1). Thus now we do not find whole towns and villages
of Gods people, but dispersed by twos and threes through the
country; a few in one town, and a few in another; one or two in
this village, and one or two in that; generally the butt and scoff of
all the rest; abhorred by a world lying dead in sin. And, indeed,
when we consider how few in number Gods quickened people are,
it must needs be so. The world at large "lieth in wickedness,"
while the elect are but "one of a city, and two of a family" (the
subdivision of a tribe) (Jeremiah 3:14), "two or three berries in
the top of the uppermost bough, four or five in the outmost
fruitful branches thereof."

But the word "scattered" not merely implies their dispersion,

locally considered—that they are a scanty, and, therefore, a
scattered people, but it also has reference to the work of the
blessed Spirit in their souls, as making them to be internally,
what they are externally—scattered in feelings as well as in
persons.

When the Holy Ghost takes a vessel of mercy in hand, his first
work is to scatter. He moves in that track which he gave to
Jeremiah when he commissioned him "to root out and to pull
down, and to destroy, and to throw down," as well as "to build,
and to plant." This divine work was known experimentally by
Hannah when she said, "The Lord killeth, and maketh alive: he
bringeth down to the grave, and bringeth up: The Lord maketh
poor, and maketh rich: he bringeth low, and lifteth up" (1Samuel
2:6,7). The first work, then, of the Spirit of God in the heart is to
scatter to the four winds of heaven everything in self that is
comely and pleasing to the flesh. All a mans self-righteousness
when the Lord lays judgment to the line and righteousness to the
plummet is broken to pieces. We may, indeed, with much pains,
great diligence, and severe labour, gather together the broken
fragments: but no sooner have we got together what the Spirit
has dispersed than the Lord blows upon them again and scatters
them once more to the four corners of the earth.

Nor is his self-righteousness, his legal obedience, and his hope

of heaven founded thereon, scattered only, but that also which
wears an evangelical garb, such as all his holiness and all his
attempts to make himself spiritual, all his diligence to recommend
himself to the favour of God by laying hold of the gospel, with all
his anxiety to read, understand, and experimentally enjoy the
word of God, all that he would thus heap up, and fain persuade
himself that by so doing he was a believer in Christ, is scattered
and dispersed: so that when he looks at his religion he finds it a
thorough wreck. His religion now no longer resembles a ship in
harbour, with all her masts, and yards, and rigging perfect, just
ready to ride proudly over the wide waste of waters, but it rather
resembles the same ship driven by a storm upon the rocks, with
the waves beating over her, and just about to part asunder.

The Spirit of the Lord is compared in Scripture to the north wind

("Awake, O north wind,") (Song 4:16), which is rough and
searching, and blows away the chaff from the threshing floors. It
is the blowing of this north wind, which tries the living family
before they are led to see what the mind of the Spirit is in thus
acting. They try sometimes, for instance, to collect their thoughts
in prayer, and fix their affections upon God: but all is scattered in
a moment. They look at their evidences, try to bring them
together, and out of them to make a good hope through grace:
but when they come to weigh them up singly one by one, a gust
of conviction or of doubt springs up which so scatters all these
evidences that there seems to be scarcely one left. They seek
after spirituality of mind, and to have their affections set on
things above, not on things on the earth. But no sooner do they
feel their hearts and affections mounting upwards, than some vile
thought rushes in, which brings a train of others, like a troop of
unclean birds falling upon a sacrifice. When they come to a place
of worship they beg, perhaps, with some earnestness on the
road, that the word may come to their souls with power from God
himself: but no sooner does the preacher begin his prayer or
sermon than something carnal, sensual, or devilish rushes into
their minds, or some gust of unbelief or infidelity blows across
them which scatters all their thoughts, and leaves them no
collectedness, fixedness, or attention. Thus, to their dismay,
instead of being able to get together a religion in which they may
stand firm; instead of amassing a store of hopes and evidences to
which they may confidently look as a safe and happy passport
into eternity, the more they look the less religion they find; and
all that they have gathered together becomes one mass of
confusion. This was the case with Job when the Lord had
scattered his religion, when, as Elihu said, "God thrusteth him
down, not man" (Job 32:13), and he poured forth that bitter
lamentation, "I am full of confusion."

II. But we will go on to consider another mark stamped upon

them—"peeled." In order to get at the spiritual meaning of this
expression, I must call your attention to what is written in
(Ezekiel 29:18), where the Lord said to his prophet—"Son of Man,
Nebuchadnezzar King of Babylon caused his army to serve a
great service against Tyrus: every head was made bald, and
every shoulder was peeled." But what made their shoulders
peel? The burdens which they bore. The soldiers in
Nebuchadnezzars army had to carry the mattock and spade, to
throw up the fortifications against Tyre. The soldiers in ancient
times wore very heavy armour, and carried upon their shoulders
spears and other weapons of war, by the continual pressure of
which the skin was often literally peeled off. Thus, when the
nation spoken of in the text is said to be "peeled," it implies that
they are a burdened people, nay, more, that they are a
continually burdened people. It was not one days service before
Tyre that made the shoulders of Nebuchadnezzars army peel, but
the continued labours which they were called to perform, the
unceasing burdens which they had to bear. And thus the
expression in the text implies that the people of God are not
burdened merely once or twice in their lives; but that theirs is an
unceasing warfare, a succession of burdens, and that they can
never put their armour off, or lay the weapons of their spiritual
warfare aside, but that they must continue to watch and fight, toil
and suffer to the end of their days as good soldiers of Jesus
Christ.

This mark, then, demolishes at a blow all those crude fancies and
visionary ideas of men, who assert that the child of God never
has but one spiritual burden in his life, that of sin under the law,
when first quickened into spiritual life; and that, when relieved of
that load by a gospel deliverance, he never more groans under
the weight of sin, but rejoices and triumphs in Christ over death,
sin, and hell, until he changes time for eternity. One would think
that the testimony of Paul was sufficient to disprove this when he
said, "We that are in this tabernacle do groan, being burdened"
(2Corinthians 5:4); and again, "O wretched man that I am! who
shall deliver me from the body of this death?" But I think that the
simple expression of the text, that the people who are brought as
a present to the Lord of Hosts are "a peeled people," is sufficient
to shew that the family of God are appointed to wear upon their
shoulders continual burdens.

But what are these burdens? The burden of sin is one which the
children of God more especially labour under in the first teachings
of the Spirit; and this at that time not so much from the workings
of their corrupt nature, into the desperate depravity of which they
are not at first usually led, but from the guilt of actual sin
committed by them. But there is also the burden of
temptation, which never seizes a man so powerfully as after he
has known something of the power of atoning blood. And thus the
people of God who, in their first exercises, have to bear heavy
burdens of guilt and convictions of sin, after they have received
some manifestations of Gods favour, have to bear the burden of
temptation. Indeed Gods children could not bear the heavy
burdens of temptation at first. The raw recruit, who is learning his
drill on the common, is not sent into battle immediately. He has
to be taught how to handle and use his arms and all the exercises
needful to make him into a soldier, before he can endure actual
service. So the child of God is not sent to fight Gods battles when
merely learning his drill. But when he is, in some degree, inured
in service, then he is sent to undergo the actual hardship of war.

Unless a living soul has some standing ground in Christ, he

cannot endure the burden of temptation. If the powerful blasts of
temptation came upon one who had no standing in the divine life,
they would sweep him away. But when the Lord has given the
soul some standing in Christ, through some knowledge of him, it
is founded upon a rock, so that however assaulted and apparently
overwhelmed, it is not carried away by the floods of temptation
that come out of the dragon. Infancy, naturally, is not the season
for hard labour. On whom do we lay the heaviest burdens? The
child or the man? Who are selected to carry the greatest weights?
The weak or the strong? Is it not in grace as it is in nature that
the stronger the man the heavier the burden? the broader the
shoulders the weightier the load? How unscriptural, then, as well
as how contrary to the teachings of the Spirit in exercised souls,
is that vain idea that a man, after his first convictions and
deliverance, is to slumber in his arm chair for the rest of his life,
as a pensioner who has obtained his discharge, never again to
see the flash of the sabre, or hear the thunder of the artillery.
Such a doctrine as this is contradicted by the experience of the
saints in all ages. These have ever found that the stronger a man
is in Christ the heavier are his burdens; the richer his enjoyment
of the love of God, the more powerful are his temptations: the
firmer his standing in the Son of God, the more fellowship has he
with Christ in his sufferings.

But the leading and special idea contained in the expression

"peeled," is a feeling of soreness and rawness. The skin peeled
off makes the shoulder additionally pained by the burdens laid
upon it. Thus the consciences of Gods living family are tender,
and very susceptible of impressions. And herein they mainly differ
from dead, hardened professors. Temptations are no burden to a
seared conscience. The internal enmity of the human heart
against God, the foul obscenities and daring blasphemies that the
prince of darkness breathes into the carnal mind, are no burden
to a man dead in a profession: nor, usually speaking, are they
acquainted with the one, or assaulted by the other.

But when the conscience is made and kept alive before God, and
the heart is tender and contrite so as to feel the impression of the
divine fingers, when it is thus tremblingly and shrinkingly alive to
the slightest touch of the heavenly hand, it is in an equal and
similar degree sensitive also to temptation. And the more tender
the conscience is, the more poignantly, for the most part, will
temptations be felt. The more alive that the fear of God is in the
heart, the more clearly will sin be perceived, and the more will it
be hated and abhorred. You may depend upon it, that no persons
are further from God than those who are really Antinomians. I
say really such, for the name is often falsely applied to such as
believe and preach a free-grace gospel, and walk in the fear of
the Lord. But I mean such characters in the professing church as
"continue in sin, that grace may abound," and, under shelter of
the doctrines of grace, live and act contrary to the precepts of the
gospel. "O my soul, come not thou into their secret; unto their
assembly, mine honour, be not thou united." I would as soon
think of uniting with notorious drunkards and libertines as with
high professing Calvinists who, by their loose talk and
conversation, cause the truth to be evil spoken of.

III. The third mark given of this people is that they are "from a
people terrible from their beginning hitherto," that is, up to the
time when the present was made. There is a little difficulty in the
language of the text here; it says, "and from a people terrible
from their beginning hitherto;" as though the people scattered
and peeled, were to be taken out of another people who were
terrible. This need not, however, create, I think, an insuperable
obstacle. The word "from" seems to have reference to the word
"present:" and as we read that the present is to be made "of a
people scattered and peeled," so the present "from a people
terrible from their beginning," appears simply to mean that the
people who are terrible are made a present of to the Lord. This
seems to harmonize best with the general drift of the text. This
expression terrible seems to my mind to carry with it two ideas.
First, that they were spiritually acquainted with the terrors of
God: and, secondly, that they were a terror to others. Now all the
family of God, each in his measure (though we can lay down
no standard of depth or duration) must know something of
Jehovah as terrible in majesty: must have a sense in their souls
of his inflexible justice, his hatred of evil, his eternal purity, and
spotless holiness.
I am not going to define—I think it impossible to define, as I just
now hinted—how deep those convictions shall be, or how long
they shall last; but I believe every living soul, before it passes
from time into eternity, must see something of Gods countenance
as of purer eyes than to behold evil, and thus come before him
with "reverence and godly fear." It would appear that the people
here spoken of were "terrible from their beginning hitherto," that
is, that they knew more or less of the Lord as terrible in majesty
all through the stages of their spiritual life up to the moment of
which the text speaks—till they were presented to the Lord of
Hosts. Not that they knew him as such always, that is,
continually, prolongedly as such; but that from time to time there
were flashes in their conscience, whereby God was made known
to them as terrible in majesty.

For instance, if they were overtaken by any backsliding, the

terrors of God were arrayed against them. If they gave way to
base lusts, the terrors of Gods holy countenance were made
manifest in their souls. If they were caught by idolatrous
affections, or entangled in the base workings of their carnal mind,
they could not cloak these things over before the eyes of him
with whom they had to do. They could not treat sin as a light
matter, or say, "my sins are all washed away, and now sin and I
have shaken hands and become good friends. It can do me no
harm, nor destroy my soul." The living family, whose consciences
have been made tender, cannot indulge such presumptuous
notions, for they feel the flashes of Gods anger against sin in
their consciences: and whatever sweet sense they may have had
of the mercy of God in the face of Jesus Christ, sin will be ever a
terror to them. Though there is no condemnation to them that
are in Christ Jesus, yet there will always be, as the case of David
sufficiently proves, anger in the mind of God against the sin of his
people.

But there is another sense in which we may take the word

terrible, and that is, that the people of God are a terror to
others. We find this intimated in the two witnesses mentioned in
(Revelation 11:1). We read there of two witnesses who were to
"prophesy a thousand two hundred and threescore days, clothed
in sackcloth," and were "the two olive trees, and the two
candlesticks standing before the God of the earth" (Revelation
11:3,4). I believe that these two witnesses, primarily and chiefly,
signify the ministers of Gods truth; and that they are two in
number, agreeably to that word—"In the mouth of two or three
witnesses every word may be established." But, in a secondary
sense, every manifested child of God is a witness for God and his
truth. "Ye are my witnesses, saith the Lord, that I am God"
(Isaiah 43:12).

Now it is said of these witnesses that they "tormented them that

dwelt on the earth;" and, therefore, when they were slain, those
"that dwelt upon the earth rejoiced over them, and made merry,
and sent gifts one to another;" so glad were they to get rid of
them. Thus not only every faithful minister of Gods truth, but
every quickened child of God also torments those that dwell upon
the earth, that is, the carnal, who make the earth their paradise
and home, and all whose affections are earthly and sensual.
Every one in whose heart is the fear of the Lord, is, in a measure,
a terror to the carnal. Paul made Felix tremble; and John Knox
struck terror into the heart of Mary, Queen of Scots. There is an
indescribable something in a child of God, which carries
conviction even to those who are enemies to vital godliness. Their
very principles are a terror to them. The doctrines of grace, for
instance, which they hold, torment, and are a terror to Arminians,
and their godly and consistent life makes them terrible to
Antinomians. As, when Moses came down from the mount, his
face shone, and the people "were afraid to come nigh him"
(Exodus 34:30), the beams of divine communion visible in him
striking a secret awe into their consciences, so "the divine nature"
of which the people of God are "partakers" (2Peter 1:4), that is
"the new man, which after God is created in righteousness and
true holiness." strikes a secret terror into the ungodly. Their very
presence infuses a secret awe.

Let, for instance, any one of you who is known to be one of the
sect everywhere spoken against, go into a chapel where there is
a dead minister in the pulpit, you strike him with more awe than
a thousand of his usual congregation. He hates you and yet he
fears you: for he knows you are a witness against him. Thus the
people of God are a terror to the carnal; and God means them to
be such. When they cease to be a terror to others, when they
cease to torment them that dwell upon the earth, they cease to
deliver a faithful testimony. O may I be a terror to Gods enemies!
O may God so endue me with the Holy Ghost that I may so take
forth the precious from the vile, and preach his word with such
faithfulness and power, as to make myself terrible to all his
enemies; whether they are despisers of grace, or pretenders to
grace; whether they grovel in the sink hole of Arminianism, or are
towering on the barren heights of dead Calvinism. And terrible
"from their beginning" too.

From the first day that the people of God are quickened to fear
his great name, they are terrible to the carnal, and sometimes,
perhaps, more then, in the early warmth of their zeal and
boldness, than afterwards. We may, in some degree, measure the
strength and activity of the divine life in our souls by this test; for
directly we turn aside unto evil, and the power of that holy
anointing is diminished which makes us a terror to others, we fall
from the position in which God has placed us; and from our high
standing as witnesses of the truth as it is in Jesus. Samson, with
his locks cut, struck no terror into the Philistines.

IV. But to pass on. The next mark of this peculiar people is, that
they are "meted out." The word "mete," is the old English word
for "measure." "With what measure ye mete, it shall be
measured to you again." This people, then, that are to be
presented to the Lord of Hosts are a nation "meted out," that is,
measured up. This expression points not so much to their persons
as to their religion; and declares that their faith is tried in the
furnace. Their experience is measured by Gods standard, and
thus judgment is laid to the line and righteousness to the
plummet in their souls.
Most certainly wherever God the Holy Ghost begins and carries on
a work of grace in the heart, he will weigh up, and mete out,
from time to time, all a mans religion, and try every inch of the
way whether it lies straight and level with the word and will of
God. Depend upon it that the Lord who "weigheth the spirits"
(Proverbs 16:2), and by whom "actions are weighed" (1Samuel
2:3), will put into his righteous and unerring scales both nature
and grace, both human and divine teaching, and make us know
which is full weight in heavens court.

The religion of the present day is too much to confuse everything

of an experimental nature; to cover and obscure the work of
grace in the heart. There is even among those who are sound in
the doctrines of truth little or no discrimination of character, no
appealing to conscience, no tracing out the lines of distinction
between grace and nature, no exposing the awful delusions of
Satan as an angel of light, no pointing out the dreadful
deceitfulness and hypocrisy of our fallen nature. But the generally
approved and well nigh universally followed system is to throw
around all professors, whose creed is sound and life consistent, a
mantle of universal charity, and ask them no inconvenient
questions. But there can be no question that God will never suffer
our religion, if, indeed, he has mercifully taken us in hand, to be
huddled up in this confused way; but he will measure it all by his
standard, and refine it in his crucible. It is in this way that we
learn the reality and genuineness of his work. Thus, if he give
faith, he will bring that faith to the touchstone, and prove it with
heavy trials.

It is in grace as in nature. When we would ascertain the exact

weight of a thing, we put it into one scale, and a standard weight
into the other, till the scales are even. So when the Lord puts
faith in one scale, he puts a burden in the other to try whether it
is standard weight. And the greater the faith the heavier the trial.
The father of the faithful had to slay his own son. If he
communicate a measure of hope, there will be many things that
cause despondency to be put into the opposite scale, that
despondency and hope may be well balanced. If the love of God
be shed abroad in the soul, there will be trials and temptations to
prove it. Thus the child of God learns the meaning of the words.
"Your work of faith, and labour of love, and patience of hope"
(1Thessalonians 1:3). Every token for good, every sip of mercy,
every manifestation of love is examined and searched into,
weighed up and balanced in the court of conscience, to know
whether it is full weight or not. And in this nice and accurate
scrutiny not only is religion weighed up, but also that which is
not religion. Sins, open and secret, backslidings, idolatrous
affections, covetous desires, presumptuous confidences, rotten
hopes, and vain props—all are weighed up in the balances of the
sanctuary. And as that which is received from God, when put into
the balances, will be found sterling and genuine; so all that did
not come from God, all that sprang from nature and the flesh, all
vain confidence, bold claims, and presumptuous notions, when
put into the scales, will have tekel stamped upon them—
"Weighed in the balances, and found wanting."

It is thus that "the dross is taken away from the silver, and there
comes forth a vessel for the finer." This is the trial of faith, which
is to be "found unto praise, and honour, and glory at the
appearing of Jesus Christ" (1Peter 1:7). This is the rod upon the
lot of the children; for "judgment must begin at the house of
God; .... the righteous scarcely be saved;" and the Lord "sits as a
refiner and purifier of silver to purify the sons of Levi, that they
may offer unto him an offering in righteousness."

And now tell me, soul, what is thy case? Do you know anything of
this measuring work? Is your religion, more or less, daily and
weekly weighed in the unerring balances of the sanctuary? And
do you find a secret hand in your conscience, that from time to
time, as it were, takes your religion and measures it before your
eyes, stamping some as genuine, and some as false; some as
from God and some as from Satan; some as the fruit of heavenly
teaching, and some as springing from a deceitful and hypocritical
heart? Be assured, if you are a people to be presented to the Lord
of Hosts, in the day when he maketh up his jewels, your religion
must be weighed in Gods balances, and stamped by him as
genuine before you close your eyes in death.

V. A fifth mark given in the text of this accepted people is, that
they are "trodden under foot."

This expression seems to indicate two things—firstly, the

treatment they receive from a world lying dead in sin and dead in
a profession: and secondly, the feelings that pass through their
own hearts. If God has made your hearts honest before him, if he
has communicated spiritual life to your souls, you will be "trodden
under foot." The world, dead in sin, will trample you beneath their
proud hoofs; and the world, dead in profession, will make your
body as the ground, and as the street that they may go over. The
laws of our land may, indeed, prevent any such literal treatment
of our persons: but do they spare what is equally, in our right
minds, dear to us? Does not the self-righteous Arminian tread
under foot the doctrines we dearly love? Does he not call them
doctrines, which lead to licentiousness, and say that they are the
invention of men, the fruit of a heated brain, and not to be found
in the Scripture? Nay, have not some, in the height of their zeal
for freewill, gone so far as to call them "doctrines of devils," and
"damnable doctrines," awful speeches indeed to come from the
mouths of professing men.

And as the Arminian, on the one side, will trample down the
doctrines, so will the notional Calvinist, on the other, tread under
foot your experience, and stamp his iron-bound heel upon all the
convictions of your burdened spirit, and the trials of your troubled
soul. Those who are at ease in Zion, dwelling "careless, after the
manner of the Zidonians, quiet and secure" (Judges 18:7), who
are never exercised or tempted, but "lie upon beds of ivory, and
stretch themselves upon their couches, and eat the lambs out of
the flock, and the calves out of the midst of the stall," and,
therefore, "are not grieved for the affliction of Joseph" (Amos 6:4,
6), will trample under foot the exercises, temptations, and
burdens of living souls. And of all professors, none, I believe, will
trample under foot the living family more than conscience-seared
Antinomians. The godly fear, the tenderness of conscience, the
respect to the Lords ordinances, and the obedience to his
precepts which the regenerated family manifest, provoke the
contempt and enmity of those who have a scheme of doctrines
clear in their brain, but whose hearts are rotten as touchwood.
Nor will they shew less contempt of your rising hopes and tender
affections, and all the ebbings and flowings of divine life in your
soul: despising and treading under foot everything short of or
different from, the presumptuous confidence in which they stand
themselves.

Expect, if you are a people whom God has formed for himself to
shew forth his praise, to be trodden under foot: to have your
motives misrepresented, your words to be the butt of calumny,
and your actions to become food for the lying tongue to
propagate its malicious falsehoods. To be despised and
contemned of all men, and yet to be beloved and blessed by their
God is the universal lot of all the living in Jerusalem.

But there is another sense in which we may understand the

expression, "trodden under foot," and that is, as I have hinted
before, in the feelings of their own hearts. In this sense they may
be said to tread themselves under foot. In my right mind, I
seem to care little to be trodden under foot by the contempt of
professor and profane. I have, indeed, even felt pleasure at being
counted worthy to suffer reproach for Christs sake. But to be
trodden under foot by myself; to feel that I deserve to be trodden
under the righteous feet of Jehovah into a never-ending hell, and
on account of my numerous and base iniquities to merit to be
trodden under foot by the saints of God—this, this cuts deep.

And not only so, but to have myself to trample down all that I
once thought was religion, my holiness, piety, and consistency,
zeal, knowledge, and devotedness, to have to take them with my
own hands, and cast them on the stones, and trample them
under feet—this cuts deeper still. But the Lord will bring us to this
spot, to tread under foot all creature-righteousness, and natural
piety, as well as all the zeal, activity, and restless diligence that
springs from, and feeds the flesh. As Babylons children, they
must be taken and dashed against the stones (Psalm 137:9). God
will teach us, sooner or later, to trample under foot everything
but the blood and righteousness of the Lamb as our salvation and
justification: and to reject all wisdom that does not spring out of
himself.

VI. The last mark which is given in the text of this peculiar people
is, "Whose land the rivers have spoiled." This people, then, had
once a land: yea, what they thought was a goodly land, one rich
in natural gifts, and teeming with everything bright to the eye,
and alluring to the senses. This is the land of our nativity, our "Ur
of the Chaldees," our Egypt. What a fair and bright land was this
in the days of our romantic youth! And have we not in those
days, stood, as it were, upon some lofty height, and looked with
eager delight upon the scene of happiness that we fancied lay
outstretched before us, promising to ourselves days of health,
and wealth, and comfort in this world? But the rivers have spoiled
the land. The waters of Gods providential dispensations have
flowed over it, and utterly marred it. Instead of being now a fair
land, it has become a sandbank. We were looking for happiness
in the things of time and sense. Some bosom idol, some bright
prospect, some well-planned scheme, some dream of love or
ambition was to be our paradise; not knowing that the sword of
the cherubim, which turned every way, was planted at the gate.
Rivers have burst forth from unexpected quarters, and forever
spoiled that land for our resting place.

But, again, there is another land, which we once fancied to be fair

and beautiful—the land of natural religion. We cultivated with
much pains and diligence the soil of our own hearts—we toiled,
dug, and planted; but reaped not; sowed, but gathered no crop
into the garner. The rivers of conviction, flowing out of the
sanctuary, spoiled the land. Have you not found, that when you
were cultivating piety, a flood of conviction broke out and spoiled
all the crop? Or when you had ploughed, and sowed, and
harrowed the field, and were looking forward to the growth of
diligence, zeal, prayer, praise, faith, hope and love, instead of
finding a harvest to reap, a flood of doubt and fear, conviction
and distress, burst forth, and carried away not only the crop, but
well nigh the cultivator himself. And yet, perhaps, when the flood
had gone off, and the rivers a little ceased from the land, you
began to cultivate it again. After the crop was swept away, you
tried hard after another; but no sooner did you begin to work,
and get the seed sown, and the field in a husband-like order,
than the rivers flowed over it, and spoiled it again.

But there is another sense in which the words may be taken; and
that is as indicating the rivers of mercy and peace that flow out of
the love of God through the channel of the Saviours blood. What
is this world? It is polluted. It is not our rest. It is defiled by sin,
and marred by sorrow, so that a child of God can here find no
abiding city. Rivers of conviction out of God as a God of justice,
and of mercy out of God as a God of love, flowing in different
channels, but tending to the same purpose, have spoiled the
land: and it is a fair and goodly land no more.

Here, then, is a description of the people of God, of those that are

to be presented to the Lord of Hosts. Does it not seem a singular
description? It is not, indeed, generally received by the professors
of the day, but that does not alter its reality or its truth. But there
is a certain period spoken of in the text when they are to be
presented, for it says, "In that time shall the present be brought
unto the Lord of Hosts of a people scattered and peeled, and from
a people terrible from their beginning hitherto; a nation meted
out and trodden under foot, whose land the rivers have spoiled,
to the place of the name of the Lord of Hosts, the Mount Zion."
And what time is this but that which is described in the preceding
verses? "For afore the harvest, when the bud is perfect, and the
sour grape is ripening in the flower, he shall both cut off the
sprigs with pruning hooks, and take away and cut down the
branches."

"In that time, " when it seems fit for nothing, but to be stubbed
and burnt as a useless stump. When it is fit for nobody, and
apparently still less fit for God, is the present to be made to the
Lord of Hosts. Then will this people, scattered and peeled, be
brought by the Holy Ghost, an acceptable offering unto God, as
being washed in the blood of his Son, and clothed in his spotless
righteousness. And observe where they are to be brought, the
spot where the offering is to be made, "to the place of the name
of the Lord of Hosts, the Mount Zion." And what is Zion, but the
place "where God has commanded the blessing, even life for
evermore?" Brought to Zion where Jehovah reigns in the hearts
of his redeemed, and where the "blood of sprinkling speaketh
better things than that of Abel." Brought to see its solemnities, to
be enriched with its treasures, and rejoice in its glory.

Thus if we are brought as a present to the Lord of Hosts, we shall

come to Mount Zion—to the city of the living God, to banquet
upon the Gospel feast, to eat and drink Gospel wine and milk,
without money and without price. And by what road, and through
what teaching? As having been pious from youth? As having been
educated religiously in the Sunday School? As having said so
many prayers, and having performed so many pious exercises?
As having mastered our besetting sins and fiery passions? As
being better than others, holier than others, more religious than
others? If we come so, we come not as the text speaks. Such
qualifications will not render us an acceptable gift to the Lord of
Israel.

The nation that is presented to him is "scattered" upon the

mountains without a Shepherd: "peeled" under the heavy weight
of trials and temptations; "terrible" to themselves and to others,
from the work of God in their hearts; "meted out" by the Spirit of
the Lord putting a standard in their conscience, to bring all that
they are and have to the test; "trodden under feet" by men, and
by themselves; without a country, without a home; for "their land
the rivers have spoiled." But in this abject state of destitution,
poverty, nakedness, and necessity, brought as an acceptable
present to the Lord of Hosts—to the place where he hath
recorded his name—even to Zion, where he lives and reigns, as
the God of all grace.
If this is true, and who can gainsay it? If these are the works of
God, and who can deny that they are? then, only, so far as we
have some divine and experimental acquaintance with these
things in our souls, have we any Scriptural testimony, that we are
either come to, or are on our way towards Zion.

And, may I not add, if you live and die without knowing
somewhat of this experience, you will never enter the gates of
glory, but be among those to whom the Lord will say, "Depart
from me, ye cursed, into everlasting fire, prepared for the devil
and his angels!"
AN ACCEPTABLE PRESENT TO THE LORD OF HOSTS

Preached at Providence Chapel, Cranbrook, Kent, on Wednesday

Evening, August 19, 1846.

"In that time shall the present be brought unto the Lord of hosts
of a people scattered and peeled, and from a people terrible from
their beginning hitherto: a nation meted out and trodden under
foot, whose land the rivers have spoiled, to the place of the name
of the Lord of hosts, the mount Zion." Isaiah 18:7

When presents are made, there is usually a correspondence

between the present and the person to whom it is given. An
ample present for a beggar would be an insult to a nobleman. But
especially when presents are made to kings, must the offering be
worthy of the royal personage to whom the gift is made;
otherwise he would consider it an affront rather than a present.
And this more particularly in ancient times and eastern climates,
where no one ever thinks of approaching a sovereign or man in
power, without laying at his feet a suitable present. Thus the
queen of Sheba, when she came to see and consult Solomon,
brought the richest presents her country could produce.

The Lord of hosts is said in the text to have a present: "In that
time shall the present be brought unto the Lord of hosts." And
what present shall he have? Shall it be gold and silver, that
object of almost universal idolatrous worship? Shall it be
diamonds, and pearls, and precious stones? Shall it be noble
buildings, and fretted aisles, and pealing organs, and chanting
voices, and the fumes of incense? He that was born in a stable
and cradled in a manger, can never look with acceptance upon
such offerings as these. Shall it be then the best that nature can
present? Shall it be such as the heart of man can lay at his feet
as its primest offering? Shall it be creature piety? Shall it be
natural religion? Shall it be human righteousness? Shall it be
anything or everything that the creature may produce? The eye
of eternal purity can never look upon the works or the words of
man, except with abhorrence, for all, all are tainted, polluted, and
deeply stained with original sin; and therefore, an offering
entirely unacceptable in the eyes of infinite purity.

What shall he then have? What offering is fit for him, for his
worth? The text tells us what the present is, that is to be brought
to the Lord of hosts; what that offering is, which he will look upon
with acceptance, and which he will graciously receive. "In that
time shall the present be brought unto the Lord of hosts of a
people scattered and peeled, and from a people terrible from
their beginning hitherto; a nation meted out and trodden under
foot, whose land the rivers have spoiled, to the place of the name
of the Lord of hosts, the mount Zion."

With God's blessing, this evening, and looking up to him, as I am

compelled, from time to time, from real soul necessity, that he
would inspire thoughts, and dictate words, and crown with power
what shall be spoken—I shall, in considering the subject, treat it
under two heads.

I.—First, show the nature of the present which is made to

the Lord of hosts;

II.—The place to which the present is brought, and the way

in which the present is received.

I.—If we look at the present made to the Lord of hosts, it is

declared by the Holy Ghost in our text to be "a people:. In that
time shall the present be brought unto the Lord of a people."
You will observe, that the "people" is the present which is brought
to the Lord of hosts. But what "people" is this? It is the elect
people of God—those that were chosen in Christ before all
worlds; as the Lord speaks so clearly and emphatically (John
17:6), "Thine they were, and thou gavest them to me." "All mine
are thine, and thine are mine; and I am glorified in them." (John
17:10) The people, then, who are to be brought as a present to
the Lord of hosts, are the elect of God; that people for whom
Christ died; that people whom he hath formed for himself, and in
whom he will show forth his praise.

But the Holy Ghost in the text describes the character of the
people who are thus brought. The text does not speak of the
people of God merely as elect, merely as redeemed, merely as
quickened by the blessed Spirit; but the Holy Ghost has selected
certain marks, which are stamped upon this people, and which
distinguish them from all other people upon the face of the earth.
And here we see much beauty and much wisdom. If there were
no description in the word of truth of the characters of God's
people, many of the Lord's family would want evidences and
testimonies that they belong to the election of grace.

Many of the Lord's people fully and firmly believe that there is an
election of grace, but they are often tried in their minds as to
whether they are personally interested in this election. They do
not cavil and fight against God's sovereignty, and the doctrines of
grace as revealed in the word of truth; their minds are bowed
down to receive them, and they firmly believe them to be "the
truth as it is in Jesus."

But the trying point with many—shall I say, the majority? of the
Lord's people is,—their own personal, individual interest in these
precious doctrines. These are the points which often try their
minds; not whether God has an elect people, but whether their
names, as individuals, are in the Book of Life. And therefore, that
we may be able to distinguish them, and that they may be able,
as the blessed Spirit shines upon their evidences, to trace out in
their own hearts some decisive marks that they are of the Lord's
family, the Holy Ghost has described their character, and pointed
out those peculiar things which are to be found in them, and in
them alone. These we shall, this evening, with God's blessing,
endeavour more fully to enter into.

1. The first mark given of this people who are brought as a

present to the Lord of hosts is, that they are scattered. Now, if
we look at the election of grace generally, this word is most true
of them. They are a scattered people. Look at this present
congregation. Is it not made up of people from many different
towns and villages? Cranbrook alone has not contributed its
population to the large assembly that fills this chapel. It is then
literally true, that the Lord's people are a scattered people;
dispersed far and wide; dwelling in the towns and villages where
God has placed them, that they may be so many living
testimonies for God's truth, and witnesses of God's grace. But
there is something deeper than that. The Lord's people are not
merely scattered as regards their local habitation, but they are
scattered in an experimental sense; and this we shall see
better, by viewing their state as contrasted with the case of
formal, dead professors. Their religion lies altogether; their
piety, their holiness, their goodness, their strength, and their
wisdom lie all in one heap; and the more they accumulate, and
the more they get together, the more collected and compact is
their strength, their wisdom and their righteousness.

But not so with the Lord's family. God's children differ completely
from them in this point, that they are scattered internally, as to
their own feelings, and as to the experience of their own hearts,
just as much as they are scattered locally up and down this
ungodly world. They are "strangers, dispersed" in their feelings,
as well as strangers dispersed in the midst of a wicked and
crooked generation. (James 1:1; 1 Pet. 1:1, 2)

Whence springs this scattering? Have you not seen sometimes on

a barn floor the wheat and chaff lying together in one confused
heap; but the barn doors are thrown open, a strong wind blows
through, and what is the immediate consequence? A scattering:
the strong breeze blowing through begins to scatter what before
lay together in one confused heap. Is not this true spiritually and
experimentally in the hearts of God's people, through the gales of
the Spirit? The Lord himself compares the operations of the Spirit
to the wind.

When these breezes blow upon the heart, is not their effect
immediately to scatter? Here was a man, before the Lord was
pleased to work upon his soul with power, dead in sin or dead in
a profession. There was no scattering then going on in his heart;
there was no separation then in his soul of that which was of God
and that which was of man, that which was of flesh and that
which was of the Spirit. But when the Lord the Spirit begins to
blow upon a man's heart, immediately a scattering takes place.
His righteousness, which before he had got together with great
pains, and looked upon in the same way as a miser often views
his accumulated treasure—when the anger of God was made
manifest in his conscience, and the breadth and spirituality of his
holy law were revealed with power, this righteousness which he
had so painfully and so laboriously accumulated was scattered to
the four winds of heaven.

His wisdom, in which he once so gloried over other men; his

clear knowledge of the doctrines in the letter, his acquaintance
with God's word, and the good opinion that he had of himself as a
wise and understanding man—no sooner does the breath of the
Lord begin to blow upon the sinner's conscience, than all this
wisdom is scattered before the wind; all his head knowledge, all
his empty profession, all the vain confidence which he once got
together, and once could build upon, are scattered and dispersed,
and he stands before God a perfect fool.

His prayers which once he could repeat so collectedly, his

thoughts which were so little confused, and his hearing which
from time to time he could give with such attention, when the
breath of the Lord begins to blow upon the heart, all become
scattered. His prayers, instead of being collected forms, are now
broken fragments of sighs and cries; his hearing, instead of
being a matter of criticism, becomes this, 'O that the Lord would
apply one word to my poor heart!' His strength which once he
could bring forward to support himself against temptation, to
overcome sin, and to crucify the flesh—when the breath of the
Lord begins to blow upon the soul, he finds to be perfect
weakness.
The vain hopes, which once he could gather together, all are
scattered when the wrath of God is made known in his
conscience, and the purity of Jehovah is revealed in his soul; and
all his confident expectations are dispersed when the breath of
the Lord blows upon his heart, and scatters them to a thousand
pieces.

So that the Lord's people who are brought as a present, and laid
at the feet of Jesus, the Lord of hosts, are not merely a scattered
people as regards their habitations, dwelling separate from the
world, separate from professors, and separate from evil, as God
the Spirit enables them; but in their feelings, in their
experience before God are they thus scattered and divided, so
as to be unable to get anything together that they can look upon
with pleasure and admiration.

2. The next mark that is given of this people that are brought as
a present to the Lord of hosts, is, that it is a "peeled" people.
There is one text in the Scripture which I think is a key to this
expression. Some of you will, perhaps, remember the promise
made to Nebuchadnezzar by the mouth of the prophet Ezekiel
(Ezek. 29:18), where the Lord tells him that he would give him
Egypt in recompense for the hard service he served at Tyre, when
"every head was made bald, and every shoulder peeled;" that
is to say, his soldiers had been so long engaged in the siege of
Tyre that their very heads had become bald through the number
of years, and they carried such heavy burdens upon their
shoulders, they so wielded the mattock and shouldered the
spade, that the very flesh of their shoulders peeled off and
became raw.

This, I think, is the Scripture key to the expression in the text, "of
a people being peeled." It is as if the blessed Spirit would bring
before us a heavily burdened people. If you were to carry a
burden a considerable distance upon your shoulder with a stick,
would not your shoulder soon become raw, and the flesh peel off?
Thus the expression seems to point out the burdens which the
Lord's people have to carry, so heavy and so long, that their very
flesh peels off through the load. For instance,

There is the burden of sin; and wherever the Lord takes a soul in
hand, he makes it feel more or less of the burden of sin. There is
also the burden of unbelief and infidelity, that many of the
Lord's people have so long and so much to groan under. There is
the burden too of a hard heart—dark, stupid, stony, unfeeling
heart, that will not relent and melt down at the footstool of
mercy. There are also many temporal, as well as spiritual
burdens which the Lord's people have to carry; afflictions in
providence, afflictions in body, afflictions in circumstances,
afflictions in family. All these make up so many burdens that they
have to bear upon their shoulders.

But the word "peeled" directs us to this idea—not merely that

they have burdens, for we may carry a burden upon our
shoulders for a time, and that burden not peel the skin off; but it
points to the length of time during which it is carried. A little
burden, comparatively speaking, carried on the shoulder for a
long time, will cause the skin to peel. And thus the Spirit seems
to guide our thoughts to the duration of time during which the
Lord's people are burdened; that they have to carry them so far,
and have to carry them so long, that spiritually they are, as a
man is naturally, "peeled" by the weight they endure, and the
time they carry it.

How many burdens have you had to carry during the time you
have made a profession of godliness? If they are heavy, and you
have carried them long, they have produced a peeled shoulder.
The Lord aims, by laying burdens on, to bring us to his feet.

I have thought sometimes spiritually of an old punishment, which

was in force in this country. If a prisoner refused to plead guilty,
he was taken to a dungeon and stripped, he was fastened down
on his back, and a weight was placed upon his chest. If he still
continued obstinate, the next day an additional weight was
placed. If on the third day he continued perverse, and the plea of
"guilty" still refused to escape from his lips, an additional burden
was put upon him; until at last, if he persevered in his obduracy,
burdens were added till his chest was crushed to pieces.

This may show, in a spiritual point of view, how the Lord deals
with his people. He puts a burden upon them: that burden does
not at first bring them down. He puts on another: that they carry
for some time in their own strength. But the Lord's purpose is to
bring them down, to force the plea of 'Guilty, guilty!' out of their
lips. And thus the Lord brings our sins to mind; lays upon our
consciences, from time to time, our secret iniquities; suffers
powerful temptations to seize, harass, and distress our souls; all
to bring us to this point, by putting burden upon burden, at last
to force the cry and plea of 'Guilty, guilty!' out of our lips.

When once that cry comes out of our heart, then the Lord puts
forth his hand, and takes the burden off the breast. But until that
cry comes out of the very depths of a broken heart—until it
comes with simplicity, humility, and godly sincerity from a
contrite spirit—burdens will be put on, until at last the soul cries,
'God be merciful to me a sinner!'

Some of the Lord's people seem to require heavier burdens than

others. There is in some, an unyielding spirit; in others, a self-
justifying temper; in a third, a proud, rebellious, perverse
disposition; in a fourth, lightness and frivolity of mind; so that,
some of the Lord's people seem to require heavier burdens than
others. But whether we require heavier burdens or lighter, to one
spot, to one point, must every child of God come—to bow down,
as a poor guilty sinner, at the footstool of mercy, there to receive
the manifestations of mercy to his soul. As we read, "He brought
down their heart with labour: they fell down; and there was none
to help." Now comes the effect—"then they cried unto the Lord in
their trouble, and he saved them out of their distresses." (Ps.
107:12, 13.)

3. The next thing said of this people is, that it is "from a people
terrible from their beginning hitherto." The word "from"
means, I think, the same thing as the word "of;" as though it ran
thus: "In that time shall the present be brought unto the Lord of
hosts of a people scattered and peeled, and of a people terrible
from their beginning hitherto." In other words, it is a mere
repetition of the preceding preposition "of." And that this is the
meaning of the expression, seems to me clear from the second
verse of the chapter—"Go, ye swift messengers, to a nation
scattered and peeled, to a people terrible from their beginning
hitherto." Not a people taken out of a people, but this being the
character of all that people.

But in what sense is this peculiar people, thus brought as a

present to the Lord of hosts, "terrible from their beginning
hitherto?" The words seem to my mind to bear this spiritual
meaning—the Lord's people who have clearly a work of grace
upon their souls are a terror to their neighbours. The very world
can see something in them which distinguishes them from the
great mass of mankind. The very professor can see something in
them which distinguishes them from others. And though they
hate the image of Christ in them, though they abhor to see the
features of grace, yet there is that in them which makes them
terrible to empty professors, because of the conviction in their
conscience, that they are destitute of those things which they see
in them.

Those that are dead in sin, and those that are dead in a
profession, are no terror to their neighbours. A man may have
the soundest doctrines in his head, but if his life be worldly,
inconsistent, and ungodly, he is a terror to nobody; the Lord's
people justly shun him, the world deservedly scorn him, and
professors cast out his name as evil. But wherever there is a real
work of grace upon the heart; wherever the blessed Spirit has
touched the conscience with his almighty finger, and planted the
fear of God as a living principle within; wherever there is a
separation from the world buried in sin or in profession, a living in
the fear of the Lord, in uprightness of heart, simplicity, and godly
sincerity—every such man, be he in a town or be he in a village,
is a secret terror to all, and more especially to those who have a
name to live while dead.

If you can be as the great majority of professors are; if you have

a Sunday religion, that you can put on when you take your
Sunday clothes from the coffer, no one will be afraid of you. But if
you have a religion in your heart, lip, and life, carried out in your
walk and conversation, you will be one of those people who have
been "terrible from their beginning hitherto." The Lord points this
out as a characteristic mark of his people, distinguishing them
from those who have the form without the power—that "from
their beginning," from the very first implantation of divine life in
their soul, from their first convictions, from their first cry and
sigh, from their first separation from the world, from their first
profession of the truth in the power of it, they were a terror.

And not only so, but "hitherto," up to the very time when they
are brought to the footstool of mercy as a present to the Lord.
They are terrible in conviction, and they are terrible in
consolation. They are terrible when under the law, and they are
terrible when under the gospel. They are terrible when almost a
terror to themselves, and more terrible when the image of Christ
is seen more clearly and distinctly in them.
Let them speak of convictions; their very convictions carry with
them a weight of evidence which is a terror to those who have
never felt convictions. Let them speak of consolations; their very
speech, thus "seasoned with salt," is a terror to those who have
never felt any genuine consolation. Let them speak of their trials,
exercises, fears, doubts, sinkings, and misgivings; they are a
terror, if they are on this dark side. Let them speak of the
whispers of lovingkindness and tender mercy; let them speak of
smiles from the Lord, and the manifestations of his favour; they
are a greater terror on the bright side than they were on the
dark. And thus the Lord's people have this mark stamped upon
them, that they are terrible from their beginning hitherto.

4. Another mark stamped upon them is, that they are "a nation
meted out." The word "meted" means measured. "With what
measure ye mete, it shall be meted to you again." (Matt. 7:3)
The present brought to the Lord in the text, is a people inwardly
"meted out" in their hearts. How are they measured? Is it not by
the Lord himself setting up a just balance in their souls? Are not
the Lord's people measured out in their own experience before
God.? Depend upon it, if we have never been measured up in our
feelings before God, the Lord himself has not put a just balance
into our soul.

But what is this meting out? It is when the Lord is pleased to

bring us to the bar of judgment; then are we measured. It is
when the Lord is pleased to send home some powerful passage of
his word to the heart; then there is a meting out. When we hear
the experience of God's people and find our own fall short of it;
then there is a meting out. When we see our deficiencies, feel our
shortcomings, have a sense of our imperfections, remember our
backslidings, and mourn over our continual idolatries; then there
is a meting out. When we look at what the Lord does for others—
the sweet smiles, the heavenly testimonies he bestows upon his
people, and feel ourselves to come short in these things; then
there is a meting out. When we see some of the Lord's people
walking closely with God, having much of his manifested favour,
living a consistent life, a life of devotedness to the Son of God,
and putting us to shame by their uprightness, consistency, and
inward close communion with Jesus; then there is meting out.

And this ever will be the verdict of a tender conscience. A man

who has nothing but a name to live while dead—the doctrines of
grace in his head without any tender feeling in his soul—is never
measured up, never meted out. He has no tender conscience, no
godly fear, no sense of God's purity and holiness, no trembling at
God's word, no discovery of God's holy law, no knowledge of his
own wickedness and sinfulness before him.

But the Lord's people carry in their bosom that fear of God which
is "the beginning of wisdom." The Lord's people have in their
breast a conscience made tender and alive. And this conscience
that the Lord's people have, falls under the power of truth, bends
before the word of God, submits to that which is commended to
their heart and comes with divine weight, authority, and power
attending it.

Thus the Lord's people, from time to time, are "meted out," by
having their experience brought forth and tested by God's
unerring word; by having, from time to time, deep exercises
whether what they hope God has done for their souls is in strict
consistency with the experience of the saints, whether their
hopes and expectations are really such as will meet with the
divine approval.

And this is the intent, and this is the profit, of a heart-searching

ministry. God from time to time send such ministers among you!
The child of God, whose conscience is tender, when he hears a
heart-searching ministry, does not sit in criticising judgment. He
looks inward. He wants to know whether the sentence of
conscience is in his favour; whether he has a sweet testimony,
that he himself has passed through these vital things in his soul.
Where he falls short, he desires the Lord will accomplish what he
has not fully experienced. What he has experienced, he blesses
God for; where he is a deficient, he cries, "What I know not,
teach thou me."

Thus under a heart-searching ministry, he bares his bosom, and

compares the work of God as traced out in the ministry with what
God has done for him. Where it is lacking, he feels a fear; where
there is a mark, he feels a sweet hope. So that the Lord's people
are distinguished from all people on the face of the globe, by
being thus experimentally "meted out" by the Spirit of God
shining with divine light into their heart, and holding up this
balance, in which are weighed up their thoughts, words, and
actions, their profession and possession, in the court of
conscience.

But those that are dead in sin, or dead in a profession, know

nothing of this weighing up. They are offended by an honest
testimony. They rise up in resentment and rebellion against those
who "take forth the precious from the vile." They cannot bear to
hear the teachings and operations of God the Spirit upon the
heart set forth, for they are condemned thereby. One whose
conscience is made tender in God's fear, desires to hear the
operations of the Spirit traced out, that he may have some
testimony that God is with him of a truth. And if he can find his
experience sweetly unfolded, if light be cast upon his path,
blessed sensations spring up in his heart of thankfulness to God,
that such feelings have passed through his soul, and he praises
God, that ever he has looked upon him in mercy and love.

But all others resent it; they cannot bear to hear the life-giving
power of the Spirit insisted upon, because it unmasks their
hypocrisy, and shows the emptiness of their profession.

5. "And trodden under foot." This is another mark of the Lord's

people, who are brought as a present to the Lord of hosts—they
are "trodden under foot." How scorned, despised, and contemned
are the Lord's people! This is the mark and stamp the Lord the
Spirit has fixed upon them. By this they are known from others—
they are "trodden under foot," despised by men, rejected and
cast out, as their Master was before them; "trodden under foot,"
as too contemptible to be thought of, as though the, were the
very dung and off-scouring of the earth. Let a man be ever so
respectable, as it is termed, in life, if he has the grace of God in
his soul, he will be "trodden under foot".

Let a minister only contend for the teachings and operations of

the Spirit upon the heart, he will be "trodden under foot." Let a
child of God come forward, in simplicity and honesty of soul, to
speak of the Lord's dealings with him, he will be "trodden under
foot." All will despise him, except the people of God, who will feel
sweet communion with him. All will pour contempt upon him,
scorn his profession, and hate his religion, because he makes the
creature nothing, and makes God all in all; because he feels and
says, that he has nothing but what God gives, knows nothing but
what God teaches, feels nothing but what God inspires, and
brings forth nothing but what God creates.
This is a sound most irksome to human ears. They can listen with
approbation to the dignity of man and the doings of the creature.
But the dealings of the Holy Spirit with broken hearts and contrite
souls, the riches of Christ's grace to the poor and needy, they
despise, and ever will despise; and the more a man has of the
likeness and image of Christ in his soul, and the more he is
manifested as one of God's own family, the more will he be
"trodden under foot".

But this is not all—there is a keener stroke than this. You and I
can bear the contempt of man, if we have the solemn
approbation of God in our soul. We can bear the sneer, jeer, and
scorn of mortal worms, who shall die, and whose breath is in their
nostrils, if we have a testimony in our souls that the Lord is our
God.

But to come to this painful point—to be "trodden under foot" of

ourselves; not merely to be "trodden under foot" of men—that
we can bear; but to be "trodden under foot" of ourselves; to see
and feel ourselves to be beyond description, the vilest of the vile,
the filthiest of the filthy; to feel ourselves dung indeed before
God, the off-scouring of all things, everything hateful and
loathsome before his pure and holy eyes—this is trying.

But it is these feelings that make us also tread upon all that
nature so highly prized before. We tread upon our own wisdom,
our own strength, our own attainments, our own qualifications;
we tread upon them all, as mean and despicable in the eyes of a
heart-searching God.

But what is more cutting still, many of the Lord's people have to
fear, deeply and painfully to fear, lest they should be also
"trodden under foot" of God; feeling themselves so vile, base,
abject, and despicable, as to fear lest the divine foot should
trample them into hell.
Thus there is a three-fold meaning in this "trodden under foot"—
"trodden under foot" of men—"trodden under foot" of
ourselves—and sometimes fearing lest we should be "trodden
under foot" of God—and the last the keenest and most cutting
stroke of all.

6. "Whose land the rivers have spoiled." They had a land

then once, and a beautiful land it was—if not in reality, at least in
imagination. Upon this land they could look, as a wealthy land-
owner sometimes walks up and down the length and breadth of
his estate; or as Nebuchadnezzar contemplated the city he had
built for himself with self-complacent admiration.

Who of us has not had a land that he has admired and idolized as
his own estate? his property, his children, his reputation, his
worldly prospects, his fancied paradise, the little Eden set up in
imagination, though he never had it in possession? But this "land
the rivers have spoiled".

We cannot enter into the full force of this expression, because the
rivers in our country are so different from the rivers in Palestine.
There torrents rush with violence from the mountains, and carry
devastation before them. The rivers in our level country rather
fertilize than destroy; but in that mountainous country they come
down with such force, and bring with them such a series of
stones, mud, and earth, that instead of fertilizing, they spoil the
land over which they rush. This, then, is the figure the Spirit has
used—"whose land the rivers have spoiled"; that is, these
unexpected mountain streams (for they come down suddenly)
rush upon the land, and spoil its smiling produce, so laboriously
and assiduously cultivated. The fields were expected to bring
forth a rich harvest, but now the rivers have spoiled them.

Has it not been so with the land in which you once so delighted?
When you were young, you looked forward to a life of happiness;
you were to be married, and you and your family were to enjoy
an imaginary paradise. But your land the rivers have spoiled.
Some dear object of creature affection has been torn from your
embrace; and thus the land that once smiled like the garden of
Eden has been spoiled by the sudden rolling down of a mountain
river.

Perhaps you had been calculating how you would get on in life,
laying your plans, and drawing your schemes, expecting to be
very comfortable and respectable in worldly circumstances. Alas,
the river has rushed down, and spoiled and desolated the land!

When, too, you began to think about religion, you thought you
would cultivate your heart, bring forth faith, hope, and love, and
all the fruits of the Spirit, by due attendance on the means of
grace. But this land also the rivers have spoiled. Look at your
worldly schemes now—look at your heart, and the image it
presents now. The once fancied fertile land—the mountain rivers
and torrents have flowed over it, and covered it with earth, dirt
and stones. Has it not been so? Have you not felt that the rivers
have spoiled it? that your earthly paradise, your fancied Eden, is
devastated? Are you not now distressed in soul, cast down in
spirit, tempted by Satan; and those very things from which you
expected to reap a rich harvest of joy and consolation have now
become a plague and torment to you?

Who would have thought that such a people as this should be

presented to the Lord of hosts—a people that nobody else would
take? Who would not have thought, viewing the subject in a
natural light, that the Lord would take the rich, the noble, the
learned, the respectable, the well-educated, the pious, the
religious, and the holy; those who have never sinned against him,
like the elder son in the 'Prodigal'? Who would not think, that if
the Lord looked upon any people at all, he would look upon such?
But the Lord's thoughts are not our thoughts, nor his ways our
ways. The people whom he takes as a present to himself, are a
people universally despised and hated, and by none so much
despised and hated as by themselves.

My friends, can any of you find these marks meeting in your

soul's experience? Here we have the inspired word of God giving
us a spiritual description of the people who are to be brought as a
present to the Lord of hosts. Let me read once more their
character: "In that time shall the present be brought unto the
Lord of hosts of a people scattered and peeled, and from a people
terrible from their beginning hitherto: a nation meted out, and
trodden under foot, whose land the rivers have spoiled."

As I have gone through the text, so far as the Lord has enabled
me to trace out the marks the blessed Spirit has given, has there
been a solemn echo in your soul? has there been a secret "Amen"
in your heart's experience that you, through mercy, are one of
the people thus experimentally described?

II.—As these, then, are to be brought as a present unto the Lord

of hosts, where is this present to be received?—"to the place of
the name of the Lord of hosts, the mount Zion." There it is
the present is to be brought; and this casts a light upon the
reason why the Lord accepts this people. It is only in mount Zion
that they can be accepted; that is, in the gospel, which mount
Zion signifies.

It is out of Zion that the law was to go forth, and the word of the
Lord from Jerusalem; it was in Zion that the Lord commanded the
blessing. Here her saints shout aloud for joy; here the great
mystery is unravelled; here the enigma is solved. The holy God
could not look upon this people with acceptance viewed as they
are in nature's rags and ruin. But when the blessed Spirit brings
this people, with all their guilt and wretchedness to mount Zion
(as the Apostle says), "But ye are come unto mount Zion, and
unto the city of the living God, the heavenly Jerusalem, the
general assembly and church of the first-born, whose names are
written in heaven,"—when (Heb. 12:22) the blessed Spirit brings
this people described by these characters, "scattered, peeled,
meted out, and trodden under foot, whose land the rivers have
spoiled"—brings them all poor and needy, brings them all tatters
and rags, brings them all wretchedness and ruin to mount Zion,
there they receive a precious Jesus into their heart, in the sweet,
unctuous teachings of the Holy Spirit.
Thus coming to mount Zion, God can receive them as a present,
all broken and shattered though they are, because he receives
them in the Person, love, blood, and righteousness of his dear
Son. And this solves the mystery. How could you and I, all filthy
and defiled as we feel ourselves to be—how could we dare to
present ourselves before the footstool of omniscient purity in our
native rags and creature ruin? We cannot; we dare not. But when
there is a spiritual discovery to the conscience of "the Mediator
between God and men, the Man Christ Jesus," faith receives the
atonement; the soul feels Jesus near, dear, and precious; there is
a sweet melting sensation under the dewy teachings of the
blessed Spirit whereby he is received into the heart and affections
as "of God made unto us wisdom, righteousness, sanctification,
and redemption".

And thus the Father indeed can smile upon this wretched people,
and thus indeed can the present be acceptably brought to the
feet of the Lord of hosts at mount Zion. Jesus presents them to
his Father, clothed with his righteousness, washed in his blood,
without spot, or blemish, or any such thing.

Thus have I, however feebly, endeavoured this evening to

describe the character of the Lord's people as a present made,
and the way in which this present is received.

What are we presenting from time to time when we come before

the footstool of mercy? When we visit a throne of grace, what do
we lay down there? Our own righteousness? our promises? our
vows? our resolutions? what we have been? what we intend to
be? Can we insult the Majesty of heaven by going to his feet, and
offering him this? No; we cannot; we dare not.

If we have a discovery of God's holy character; if we have a

sense of our guilt and ruin before him—as the text describes
God's people—we shall come poor and needy, having nothing and
being nothing, lying low at the footstool of mercy, deserving
God's eternal displeasure, and yet looking up to the Mediator
between God and man, and embracing, as the Spirit gives faith
and power, the crucified Jesus, as all our salvation and all our
desire.

But how different this is from the ways and works of man! "Make
yourselves better, reform your lives, lop off the branches of sin,
give up bad habits, forsake old companions, make yourselves
new hearts." Is not this the language of the day? Do not these
words sound from a thousand pulpits? And what is the fruit of all
this lip labour? To make the proud prouder, and the hard harder;
to drive farther from God those who are already far from him.

The Lord the Spirit does not teach his people thus. He teaches the
people of God what they are; he leads them to the hole of the pit
whence they were digged, makes them feel their ruin and
wretchedness, and shows them, and that effectually, what they
are—guilty, vile, lost, perishing, and undone. Thus he opens a
way to receive Jesus, as of God made unto them all he is to the
church.

When I feel my helplessness, it makes me come unto him on

whom help is laid. When I feel my poverty, if I see his boundless
riches, it makes me highly prize them. If I feel my guilt, and the
blessed Spirit reveal his blood, how suitable to my guilty
conscience! If I see my nakedness, how suitable is his glorious
righteousness! If I feel sinking, how suitable to have the
everlasting arms upholding my drooping soul! These are the
qualifications that the blessed Spirit works in the hearts of God's
people; which are not required once only, but are continually
needful; for only so far as these qualifications are wrought and
brought forth in our hearts, can we see any glory, any beauty,
any preciousness, or any suitability in Jesus.

Have then you and I ever felt him precious? I hope I have at
times felt him precious to my soul. But when has it been? When
we have been wise, holy, righteous, religious, and doing
something for him? No; not so. When we were poor and needy;
when smitten with guilt and shame; when bowed down with the
guilt of sin; when sunk into the ruins of self; when we had
nothing and were nothing but rags and wretchedness. Then it is
that the Lord of life and glory makes himself precious to the
perishing sinner by opening up the riches of his dying love to the
broken and contrite heart. This is the way, the only way, to grow
up as he is; and this is the way, the only way, to grow up into
Christ when received.

My friends, your own wisdom, your own strength, your own

righteousness, your own religion—away with it! It is not worth a
straw in the things of God. But the deeper you feel your need, the
more suitable Jesus is. The more empty, the more room to be
filled; the more stripped, the more room to be clothed; the more
cast down, the more room to be raised up.

And thus, when opened up in the Spirit's light, we see what a

suitable present this is for the Lord. Is it not a monarch's highest
boast and prerogative to be free and bountiful? Is not this
glorifying to the regal dignity of the Son of God—to receive
nothing, but to bestow everything? What! shall I give him my
righteousness as an equivalent? Shall I present him my good and
holy life to purchase his dying love? It is worthless. But when I
come as having nothing and being nothing but a mass of
depravity and rags, and he is pleased to discover to my needy,
naked soul his suitability and preciousness, what a sweet union
there is between a poor sinner and a complete Saviour, betwixt a
broken heart and a precious Jesus, betwixt a soul in its feelings of
guilt and shame and him who is mighty to save, "God over all,
blessed for ever."

Do you hope—do any of you hope—that you will one day face to
face see the Lord as he is? that you are among this present which
is to be brought to the Lord of hosts, to appear on mount Zion,
with eternal glory on your heads, when sorrow and sighing flee
away? Is this your hope? Do you look up sometimes with a good
expectation that you will one day be safe before the throne? But
can you find any mark I have described in your experience? To
know this, is to know the whole case: for if you are received and
presented on mount Zion here below, you will be presented
hereafter and stand on mount Zion above.

It is a mercy to feel any marks of grace written by the finger of

God upon your heart and conscience. It is not because you are
very holy, very spiritual, very consistent, though these are good
when they come from the work of the Holy Spirit, and are his
blessed fruits and graces. But we are not to bring these things,
and lay them at the footstool of mercy, as though we could
exchange them for "gold tried in the fire." No, the Lord will teach
us that we are indeed poor and needy; that we are nothing and
have nothing; that what we have is his gift, and what we are is
his work.

Have I then had this evening a witness in some hearts, that they
do know these things by vital experience? However tried,
tempted, and cast down they may be, may God give them this
sweet consolation that all their trials and exercises are for this
one purpose—to lay them low and keep them low—to bring them
a present to the Lord of hosts, and to endear him to their hearts
in his covenant grace and dying love.
The Accuser of the Brethren Cast Down and Overcome

Preached at North Street Chapel, Stamford, on Lord's Day

Morning, May 27, 1860

"And I heard a loud voice saying in heaven, Now is come

salvation, and strength, and the kingdom of our God, and the
power of his Christ: for the accuser of our brethren is cast down,
which accused them before our God day and night. And they
overcame him by the blood of the Lamb, and by the word of their
testimony: and they loved not their lives unto the death." Rev.
12:10, 11

Unfulfilled prophecy has occupied the thoughts and been the

subject of much attention on the part of many preachers and
writers in this day of widespread profession. And I must confess
myself that I think it is scarcely possible for a person with an
enlightened eye to read the Old Testament prophecies without
seeing that many glorious things spoken therein concerning the
Church of God have not yet had their strict and entire fulfilment.
There was a time, indeed, in years gone by, when my mind
seemed drawn to this subject, and when I took some pleasure in
paying attention to it. But for the last four or five and twenty
years I have felt my mind drawn from such matters by several
considerations, which have weighed with some power upon my
conscience. First, I have seen that the exercised family of God,
especially the poor of the flock, have paid little attention to
subjects of this nature; that they have not formed a part of their
teaching from above, or been wrought in their experience by the
power of God. I have seen also that when ministers have pursued
these subjects with any degree of earnestness—and they are very
attractive to certain minds not weighted by trials and afflictions—
they have been drawn aside from the firm, solid ground of
experimental truth to deal more in matters of speculation, and
have thus left the power for the form, and the Spirit for the letter.
I have moreover seen and felt that these subjects, though in
themselves very great and glorious, are little adapted to a time of
sickness and affliction; that what we then want is the presence of
God felt in our soul, the blood of Christ sprinkled upon our
conscience, the love of God shed abroad in our heart by the Holy
Ghost, and clear testimonies and bright, indubitable evidences of
our own interest in the finished work of the Son of God. As, then,
these matters of gracious experience, in which not only all the life
and power of vital godliness, but all hope of salvation itself
depends and centres, press with weight and force upon the
conscience, we are led to pay to them more undivided attention,
and to feel that they must be our all in all. If a person were to
offer me two bags, and say, "Here is a bag of silver for you and
here is a bag of gold," I might not despise the silver; I might say,
"I thank you very kindly for the offer of the silver bag: it is good
coin; but I prefer the gold, though not a quarter the size, for
there is more weight, substance, and, above all, more value in
it." Thus, though I do not disregard and cast utterly out such
subjects as are spoken of in the prophets and the Book of
Revelation, which I see looming in the distant future, and to
have, as such, a glory of their own, yet I want, for my own soul's
need, something closer, nearer, more wrought into my very
heart; a vital, personal, individual experience of love and blood,
grace and truth, presence and power, manifestation and
revelation; in a word, of Christ and his salvation, tasted, handled,
felt, and enjoyed. At such seasons, which may come soon, and
which must come sooner or later, I shall not want my thoughts
occupied with subjects that I might understand merely with my
brain and speculate upon as pure matters of opinion, but those
vital realities and heaven-sent blessings which shall support my
soul in sinking moments, and bear me safe through the swellings
of Jordan.
But, apart from these thoughts and feelings which embody the
result of my own experience on this subject, in reading the
Prophets, I see not merely glorious things spoken of the Church
of God which will no doubt have their fulfilment at the appointed
time, such as the conversion of the Jews and the millennial reign
of peace; but I realise in these very unfulfilled prophecies an
experimental meaning. I feel that the Church of God is already in
a spiritual possession of the very blessings predicted; for I have
no idea of a carnal millennium; of a peace distinct from the peace
of God which "passeth all understanding;" or of a prosperity in
which the soul does not live under his smile. I cannot here
enlarge, but simply throw this out that you may see that I am not
one of those interpreters of the word, who see in it visions of
future glory distinct from the glory of God in the face of Jesus
Christ, and a dispensation of blessings different from such as are
now communicated to the church by the Holy Ghost. So without
professing any large or peculiar measure of divine light, I can also
see experimental things couched in the descriptions given in the
Prophets both of the future sufferings and the future deliverances
of the church of God. Take, for instance, the words before us. I
have no doubt that as written by the pen of John through the
inspiration of the Holy Ghost, there was some prospective
reference in them to events which certainly then had not taken
place; say, for instance, the sufferings of the martyrs under the
Roman emperors. This, then, when written, was unfulfilled
prophecy, and was fulfilled when the martyrs overcame all
accusations and all sufferings by the blood of the Lamb and the
word of their testimony. But under this external surface, inside
this shell (shall I call it?) of once unfulfilled prophecy, I find
something experimental, suitable, sweet, and precious not only
then but now; not only for the outward martyrs but for the
inward martyrs: not only for the fighters and conquerors of the
second and third centuries, but of the nineteenth, and till time
itself shall be no more. And in this way, with God's blessing, I
shall treat our subject this morning: neglecting,—not despising,
but for a moment neglecting the more literal explanation of it as
indicative of a then unfulfilled event, and preferring, as more
suitable and profitable, to dwell upon those personal and
experimental matters that seem to my mind to spring up directly
from the words of the text. In so doing let me call your attention
to three main features which seem to me to stand forward very
prominently in it:

I.—First, the description that God has given of the "accuser of the
brethren," and especially as stamping upon him this character,
that he "accused them before our God day and night."
II.—Secondly, that this accuser of the brethren was cast down
and overcome, the Holy Ghost blessedly adding the three ways
by which the brethren were enabled to come off more than
conquerors: the blood of the Lamb, the word of their testimony,
and their martyr spirit, the last weapon being indicated by the
words that "they loved not their lives unto the death."

III.—Thirdly, the shout of triumph, heard in consequence in the

very courts of heaven, "Now is come salvation, and strength, and
the kingdom of our God, and the power of his Christ."

I.—The "accuser of the brethren," beyond all doubt, is Satan. We

find him thus introduced in various parts of God's word, as, for
instance, in the opening of the book of Job, where he comes to
accuse Job before God as serving the Lord merely for the
temporal benefits that had been bestowed upon him, and
insinuating that if God put forth his hand and touched his
substance or touched his person, he would manifest that he was
not what he was generally taken to be, one who feared him
above all other men, but that he would curse God to his face.
Now, as regards this personal accusation of the saints
represented in our text by the words "before our God," we can
hardly think that Satan has admission into the very courts of
bliss, there in the highest heavens to accuse personally the
saints; for we read of "the celestial city which descended out of
heaven from God" that "there shall in no wise enter into it
anything that defileth or that worketh abomination, or maketh a
lie." (Rev. 21:10, 27.) How, then, can the worker of all
abomination, the great lover and maker of lies, find access into
the courts of heaven? If nothing can enter there which defileth,
how can the head defiler, the defiler in chief, the foul fiend of all
iniquity, who is ever seeking to defile the imagination, pollute the
lips, and stain the life of the saints of God, and to fill the world
with blood and crime, obtain access there? How can we believe
for a single moment that he can pass the borders of heaven and
come into the immediate presence of God, who is holiness itself?
But you will say that it is so represented in Job and the last
chapter of 1 Kings. I quite admit that; but I believe that it is
represented so to our faith; it is to bring the subject more clearly
and vividly before our mind, and impress it with greater power
upon our soul. Thus, in our text, the accuser of the brethren is
spoken of as accusing them before God: not that he went into the
very presence of God, into heaven itself, where Jesus now rules
and reigns at the right hand of the Father; that there he stood
before the throne of God and the Lamb, and there, pointing his
finger to the saints of God upon earth, kept accusing them day
and night, as if he himself were always in heaven seeing the face
of Jehovah, of the various crimes he could lay to their charge.
Surely, amidst the music of saints and the songs of angels, there
is not heard the screech of devils. I can no more believe this than
I can believe there will be heard in heaven in the day of the grand
jubilee, the blasphemies of the lost mingling with the praises of
the saved. But in accusing them before God, Satan is represented
mystically, this being above all others a mystical book and full of
figures and emblems, as accusing them where the presence of
God is especially felt, and where everything lies naked and open
before the eyes of him with whom we have to do. In this sense
he accuses them "before" or in the presence of God. And as the
conscience is the place where the presence of God is peculiarly
felt in the matter of accusation, it is in the court of conscience
that the accuser of the brethren accuses them before God day
and night. Thus, as the Lord searches the heart by his Spirit and
grace, lays open and bare before his eye every secret crevice and
corner, and this is, so to speak, the battle-field where the grand
contest, the fight of faith for eternal life, is fought and won, we
may say that in accusing them before our God day and night, it is
in the court of conscience, in that place where the presence and
power of God are sensibly felt, that this accuser of the brethren
lays his weighty charges.

1. But this accuser of the brethren must have some real and
substantial, some true and well-grounded, accusations to bring,
or his charges would fall to the ground at once, or after a short
investigation. If I were to accuse a man of any crime, unless
there were some foundation for my accusation, it would fall back
upon my own head, and I should be branded as a base
calumniator of an innocent person. So if Satan had no ground to
go upon, his accusations would at once fall back upon his own
head; he would have no place on which he could stand, but be at
once put out of court. That which gives Satan such power as an
accuser in our conscience, and makes his accusations to be so
telling is, that there is truth in them; and our conscience, so far
as it is made and kept alive and tender in the fear of God, is
compelled, necessarily compelled, to fall under the accusations
laid to our charge. To bring the matter more clearly and vividly
before your eyes, let me represent how the believing soul, under
divine teaching, stands before God in prayer and supplication in
its solemn approaches to the throne. Now as in the book of
Zechariah (3:1), when Joshua stood before the Lord, Satan stood
at his right hand to resist him; so sometimes in a measure it is in
our approaches to the throne of grace. Satan stands at our right
hand to resist us; and the way he resists us is by bringing
accusations, which sometimes from the reality, and sometimes
from the appearance of truth, we in our own strength have no
power to repel. When, for instance, he accused Joshua of being
"clothed in filthy garments," Joshua could not deny the charge:
the filthy garments were actually at that very moment upon him.
He had but to look down, and the garments themselves hung all
round him as so many undeniable present witnesses to the truth
of the charge. So if Satan brings against you, in the court of
conscience, such and such sins, such and such slips and falls,
such and such backslidings as committed by you, your own
conscience bears witness to the truth of the charge; and it is this
which gives the accusation such power and such pungency. Or
take a child of grace under the first teachings of God, drawing
near to the throne under a feeling sense of guilt; the dreadful
curse of the law raging as a fire in his bones; the anger of God
reflected upon his conscience as a consuming fire; the terrors of
hell setting themselves in array against him, and the fears of
death, the very king of terrors, standing up before his eye as so
many gaunt spectres to usher in his fearful doom. But how, it
may be asked, does Satan accuse this trembling sinner, and how
are we to distinguish between his accusations and those of the
law and of conscience? That he does accuse him is most certainly
true, for he accuses day and night, that is, continually. But the
way in which he accuses is this. He adds to all the weight and
force of a condemning law and an accusing conscience, by
representing in the blackest light the sins and crimes of which
that trembling one has been guilty. He makes the case out to be
as bad, as desperate, and as hopeless as he possibly can. And in
the old state trials, before England had won her present liberties,
the counsel for the crown always stated the case against the
prisoner in the strongest language and painted his imputed
treason in the blackest colours, endeavouring, by force or fraud,
to secure his conviction; so Satan, as the accuser of the brethren,
in seeking to condemn a guilty soul, will ever bring forward the
blackest facts and represent them before the eyes in the darkest
colours. All the sins that you may have committed from infancy
upward; every crime that you may have been guilty of before you
were called by grace, and every slip and fall that you may have
made since; all these he will bring before your eyes and accuse
you with as utterly unpardonable, so that it shall seem at times
as though you must sink under their dreadful guilt and burden,
and scarcely lift up your eyes to heaven to beg for mercy. And
not only whilst under the law, when there is nothing before the
eyes but death and terror, but even after the Lord has been
pleased to favour the soul with some good hope in his mercy, or
with some manifestation of his pardoning love and grace, and
some inward testimony of a personal interest in the blood of the
Lamb, Satan will not even then cease his accusations. He will
accuse of hypocrisy, of insincerity, of deceit; that what the soul
felt and handled and tasted in these seasons was not of God, was
merely an ebullition of nature, arose from excitement, or
delusion, or something that was not a divine reality. And if in an
hour of temptation, we have been betrayed into any slip or fall; if
Satan, by spreading a suitable snare, has gained the victory over
us, and we have had to fall down before God with a cry in our
heart, "Unclean, unclean! guilty, guilty, before thee!" how then
will he add all the weight of his charges and accusations, and how
the accuser of the brethren, who knows neither mercy nor pity,
will press home the charge that he may sink the soul into utter
despair.

2. But he is said to accuse them "before our God day and night;"
that is, incessantly, and more by night than by day; for it is in the
night season, when all is still and solemn, that Satan seems to
have special access to the mind. In the day, the distractions of
business, or worldly occupation, may seem for a time to draw the
mind away from the things of God, and then Satan has not the
same power as in those seasons when the world has for a time
dropped its hold upon the attention, and business and occupation
no longer press. Have you not sometimes waked up in the middle
of the night with such gloom over your mind, such distress in
your soul, such doubt, and guilt, and fear, that you could scarcely
explain or account for; it may be terrified with horrid dreams, in
one of which you have, as you dreamt, committed some dreadful
sin, and wake up in guilt and alarm under its pressure? This Job
felt, ascribing his dreams to God, as not seeing they came from
Satan. "When I say, my bed shall comfort me, my couch shall
ease my complaint; then thou scarest me with dreams, and
terrifiest me through visions, so that my soul chooseth strangling,
and death rather than life." (Job 7:13, 14, 15.) How Satan in
these dark seasons, when night and silence thicken the gloom,
will press home his charges, accusing of insincerity, hypocrisy,
deceit, and delusion, and of anything and everything but what he
knows to be true. For he, as the unwearied adversary, as the
great accuser of the brethren, has false charges to bring as well
as real. He can accuse of hypocrisy, when the heart is hating the
very thought of it; of insincerity, when God has planted his fear
deep within for the very purpose of making it right before him; of
infidelity, blasphemy, of sinning against the Holy Ghost—sins
which of all others the regenerated soul most abhors and from
which it is really most free. But as the seeds of all these sins are
in us and their workings felt, Satan acts on these seeds and these
workings, warming them as it were into life as the serpent's eggs,
and then fathers these crawling reptiles on our regenerate heart.
He thus accuses us of all these sins, as though, by feeling them,
we had consented to them, and as if they spontaneously
emanated from us, as our own cherished and indulged children,
when all the while they are but hatched on the dunghill of our
nature by his own infernal breath, and might scarcely have life to
crawl, bite, or sting, unless he had brooded over them to hatch
them from the egg. Thus sometimes, by true charges and
sometimes by false; sometimes by taking advantage of us in the
hour of temptation to cast down into a snare, and sometimes
embracing the opportunity of the guilt and despondency
gendered by the slipping into it, to press the accusation of the
very evil that he has led us into, does this accuser of the brethren
accuse the saint before the throne of God day and night? You
may indeed not have been able to trace whence these
accusations came; and in fact it is very difficult to distinguish
between the accusations of the law, of your own conscience, of
the wrath of God, of the witness within of your own guilt and
shame, and those accusations that Satan brings as the accuser of
the brethren. As in a crowd, where there is a hubbub of voices, it
is hard to distinguish one voice from another; so in the confusion
that sometimes takes place in the mind, (as Job says, "I am full
of confusion,") it is very difficult to distinguish the accusing voice
of Satan from the accusing voice of conscience; the despondency
that Satan creates by his false charges from that created by the
rebukes and frowns of God. So what with the confusion into
which the mind is thrown, rendering it unable to distinguish the
false from the real, and the force and pungency of those
accusations which are true, the accused soul hardly knows what
to say or do, for that which gives the accuser of the brethren
such great power, is that he has a witness against us in our own
bosom.

II.—But I pass on to show that though the brethren in our text

were accused by Satan day and night, and though there were
many things in them which gave power and pungency to his
accusations, yet the accuser did not prove the victor: "And they
overcame him by the blood of the Lamb, and by the word of their
testimony; and they loved not their lives unto the death." Victory
is certain for all the saints of God. They are made more than
conquerors through him that loved them. They will come
triumphantly out of all charges. The conflict may be fierce, the
fight severe and long, but victory is sure in the end.

I. But observe how the brethren met the charges. If a man is

accused of a crime, the best way to deliver himself from the
accusation is clearly to prove his innocence. But what is a man to
do if his own conscience be against him, if he be really guilty of
the crime laid to his charge? How is he, then, able to prove his
innocency? He must then do one of these two things, either
confess his crime and cry for free pardon, or he must find an
advocate who can undertake his cause, and bring him off in spite
of the accusations of his adversary and the condemnation of his
own conscience. Now the brethren who were accused by Satan
night and day never attempted for a moment to take the first
course. They never thought of trying to establish their own
righteousness, or to prove their own innocence. They knew well
that such a plea would not be available; but any attempt to make
it would only cover them with shame; that Satan would in a
moment pierce through such armour; that such a sword would be
struck out of their hands at the very first blow; that the very
judge himself would refuse to receive such a plea; and that every
one in court would cry shame upon the criminal if he attempted
to make it. They must, therefore, they knew, turn their eyes in
another direction and seek help from another quarter. But looking
up, as if in despair of help, they caught a view of the bleeding
Lamb, as the Lord Jesus Christ is represented in this very book:
"And I beheld and lo, in the midst of the throne, and of the four
living creatures, and in the midst of the elders, stood a Lamb as it
had been slain" (Rev. 5:6); and as they thus by faith looked up to
the Lamb slain from the foundation of the world, they viewed the
atoning blood as it fell from his hands and feet and side, and
every drop of that blood they saw was infinitely precious, for it
had the value and validity of Godhead stamped upon it. Thus
viewing the atoning blood of the Lamb, and finding and feeling its
efficacy to purge their conscience from guilt, sin, and shame,
they pleaded, as though they would say each for himself, "I am
guilty, guilty, guilty; in myself I have nothing to plead as being
innocent of these heavy charges; so far from that, I freely
acknowledge that I deserve to be taken away, bound hand and
foot, and cast into outer darkness. The accuser of the brethren
has brought for the most part accusations against me which I
cannot answer, and though he may have aggravated them or
mixed false charges with them, yet in substance they are true.
But I turn my eyes away from all hope and help in self, and I
view with the eyes of faith the atoning blood of the Lord the
Lamb, and there I build my hope. This, then, is my plea—the
blood of the Lamb. I have, I wish to have no other." Now this was
a plea that Satan could not answer. He knew that Jesus Christ
was the Son of God and God. He knew that it had been hung over
his head as a declaration against him from the lips of him who
cannot lie, when he was in the form of a serpent in the garden of
Eden, that "the seed of the woman should bruise his head." He
knew that the Son of God was to assume human nature into
union with his divine Person, for how else could the seed of the
woman, whom he had so easily beguiled and overcome, crush his
head into the dust? And he also well knew, if not before yet
certainly after the resurrection, that this was the way of salvation
that God had purposed in his dear Son becoming man; and that
the blood of Jesus Christ cleanseth from all sin when believingly
viewed and experimentally made known. When, therefore, the
blood of the Lamb was looked unto and presented before his eyes
as an available plea, Satan felt that his accusations must fall to
the ground, for here was God's own declaration of justification—
the pardon of all the sins alleged against the criminal. In our
earthly courts, if the sovereign steps in with a free pardon, the
accused is at once released. This, before tyrannical and arbitrary
sovereigns abused the privilege and were therefore stripped of it,
was frequently the case in this country. But monarchs are but
men, and we are therefore compelled to tie their hands lest
power should defeat justice, and favouritism shut out merit. But
the King of kings does not rule by human laws, and therefore
freely pardons all whom he serves.

Still, there was one thing wanting. He might say, and does say,
as an accuser in the conscience, "It is true, perfectly true, that
the blood of Jesus Christ cleanseth from all sin; it is true, beyond
all doubt and question, that the saints of God are washed in that
blood, and that by his righteousness they are all freely justified
from all their sins;" for Satan, to serve his purpose, can preach
truth as well as error; can point out the hopeless glories of
heaven to desponding saints as well as hide the flames of hell
from presumptuous sinners. "But," adds he, "true, most certainly
as all this is, has that blood washed, has that glorious
righteousness justified you? Are you a saint of God? If you were,
would you have such a heart as you have? so filthy and unclean;
so proud, rebellious, and unbelieving? Could you be continually
imagining to yourself, and even indulge those thoughts and
feelings, those desires and lusts, of which I accuse you to your
face, and which you cannot deny? Would you have slipped and
fallen as you have done on this or that occasion? Would you have
been betrayed so easily, so that instead of sin tempting you, you
rather tempted sin; and instead of my spreading the snare for
you, you rather laid it down before your own feet? Would a child
of God have acted so? And besides all these marks and evidences
against you, what marks have you for you?" Thus, though the
child of grace may appeal to atoning blood, yet Satan can meet
that plea by saying, "It is true that the blood of Christ cleanses all
the saints of God from all sin; but unless you are a saint of God,
that blood is of no avail to you. That plea, therefore, cannot save
you from my accusations and the wrath of God due for your sins."
You see, then, that you want something more than your first
plea. You want an evidence in your own bosom that you are a
saint of God. Satan keeps telling you that you are a sinner—a
sinner doomed to die, whom he will drag to hell, whom he will
torment when he has got you there for ever and ever. You have
to prove the accusation false, that you are not a lost sinner, but a
saved saint. But you must have a witness in the same place
where the accusation is; you must have a testimony in your
conscience that you are a saint as well as that you are a sinner.
Of that you want a clear evidence; and if the Lord is pleased to
shed abroad his love in your heart, or sprinkle upon your
conscience the atoning blood, or even, without any powerful
manifestation, give you a considerable measure of faith, or raise
up a sweet hope, or apply a precious word of promise to your
heart, this gives you an evidence that though you are a sinner
and as such freely own the truth of Satan's accusations, yet you
are a saint of God's own making, and that is so far an answer to
his charge.

But there is something wanting still: you must have the blood
applied. As the high priest took the blood of the bullock and goat
and sprinkled it on and before the mercy seat; so the blood of
sprinkling must be applied to the conscience, for it speaketh
better things than the blood of Abel, which cried to God for
vengeance, but this cries to God for mercy. In purging the
conscience from guilt, the blood of sprinkling purges it from the
accusations of Satan, for they cannot remain when guilt is gone.
Nor is there any other way whereby the inward accusation of
Satan can be overcome than by a sweet assurance of a personal
interest in the atoning blood of Christ, through the precious blood
being applied to the conscience and sprinkled by the Holy Ghost
upon the heart.

ii. But they had another weapon whereby they fought Satan and
overcame him: this was, "the word of their testimony." I
understand by this expression two different things. 1, The
testimony which the word bears to them; 2, The testimony which
they bear to the word. The first is the testimony from the word;
the second is the testimony to the word. Let us examine both:—

1. The word of God, not in the bare letter but as a living

testimony from God, had been made life and power to their soul;
as the Lord himself speaks, "The flesh profiteth nothing: the
words that I speak unto you, they are spirit, and they are life."
(John 6:63.) It is called elsewhere "the sword of the spirit, which
is the word of God." Now when the Lord is pleased to apply his
word with power to the soul, it becomes "the word of our
testimony;" or as it may be rendered, the word of our witness;
that is to say, it bears a certain witness for God in the heart.
When the sword is put by the power of God into our hands, then
we can wield that weapon as given to us by the King of battles,
who teacheth our hands to war and our fingers to fight. If ever
the Lord has been pleased to apply a promise, bring home a
passage of Scripture, seal upon your heart any word of truth, he
has made that portion of his word yours. As in ancient days,
when the youthful warrior went into the field, the father took his
own sword down from where it hung, and as he put it into his
hand, said, "Go forth, my son, with this sword wherewith I once
carved my way to victory. It is a true Damascus blade, which will
neither break nor bend;" so when the Lord applies a passage to
the soul, and brings a passage home with divine power to the
heart, he puts the sword of the Spirit into the believer's hand,
and by this sword of the Spirit he is enabled to fight with Satan.
If there is power put into the word of God when applied to the
heart, it becomes ours by the surest and best of all donations, for
God has given it to us. We see how the blessed Lord, when
tempted of Satan, answered again and again, "It is written! it is
written! it is written!" And were not those words given him by his
heavenly Father, as he himself speaks, "I have given them the
words which thou hast given me?" (John 17:8.) Satan felt the
keen edge of that sword and slunk away discomfited. We must
follow, as far as enabled, this blessed example. There is no use
reasoning with the devil, attempting to outface him and outwit
him by carnal argument: he is too great a master of logic to be
overcome by such weapons. The word of truth commended to
your conscience, the word of God applied to your heart, your
having a living faith in it, making a spiritual use of it, holding it up
against Satan, sometimes to parry his attacks and sometimes to
make him feel the point and edge of that keen sword; thus resist
the devil, and he will flee from you. The word of God has
wondrous power when it is divinely felt in all trials and conflicts,
but in none more than in repelling the assaults of the wicked one.
There is no better weapon, for instance, whereby we can meet
the accusations of Satan, as referred to in our text, but the word
of truth as made life and power to the soul. If God has ever
spoken with power to your soul a word like this, "Go in peace: thy
sins are all forgiven thee;" or if he has ever said, "I have loved
thee with an everlasting love: therefore with lovingkindness have
I drawn thee;" or if ever he has manifested mercy to your soul by
the application of any promise to your heart, and in the hour of
temptation and accusation brings to mind and memory what he
spake in days past, and enables you to take up the sword of the
Spirit that may have lain in the scabbard for a while, but which
now you are enabled to draw by the hand of faith: then you may
engage Satan hand to hand and foot to foot. For this is "the word
of your testimony" as being the witness from God in your
conscience that he is on your side. Thus, these ancient saints,
these blessed martyrs (for of them the Holy Ghost here chiefly
speaks), when Satan accused them before God day and night, did
not attempt vain reasonings, nor carnal arguments, nor to
encounter him by his own weapons of logic and wisdom. They
simply used the word of God's grace, the power of which they
had felt in their own heart, which they knew had come from God
by feeling its effects; and they cut Satan down with the sword of
the Spirit, which God had put into their hands—the only weapon
that Satan really feels or fears.

2. It thus became the word of their testimony for God as it had

been made the word of their testimony from God. They could now
testify to the mercy of God as felt, to his love as experienced, to
his grace as made known, to his power as realised, and to his
faithfulness as proved; and by testifying for God what they had
received from God, they repelled the accusations of Satan by
proving to his face that their Sovereign Judge before whom he
accused them was their Father and their Friend.

iii. But there was a third weapon wherewith they fought and
whereby they conquered, which I have briefly characterised as a
martyr spirit, indicated by the words, "and they loved not their
lives unto the death." We do not hear of martyrs dragged to the
stake in England now as in the days when Popery prevailed. The
persecuting spirit smoulders in many breasts, but it has not yet
relighted the fires of Smithfield. In foreign climes, however, as in
Turkey, Spain, and in Italy, till late events snapped the yoke of
king and priest, pope and prelate asunder, persecution drags the
witnesses for Christ to loathsome prisons and deprives them if
not of life, of life's chief treasure—liberty. But in our country, in
this favoured isle, persecution in these open violent forms has
ceased for many years, and we freely enjoy those civil and
religious liberties, for they stand or fall together, which our
suffering forefathers won. But, though outward martyrdom has
ceased, there are inward martyrs. Stake and bonfire, hot pincers
and thumbscrews, rack and torture are not used now; and fines
and imprisonment for religious belief the spirit of the times will
not suffer. The scourge of the tongue is now wielded instead of
the scourge on the back, the character is branded instead of the
forehead, and they cut off reputations instead of cutting off ears.
But there are other martyrs besides those who have died at the
stake and languished in prisons. Hart beautifully says:—

"See the suffering Church of Christ,

Gathered from all quarters:
All contained in that red list,
Were not murdered martyrs."

There is an inward as well as an outward martyrdom—a torture of

soul as well as a torture of the body; and in this sense all the
people of God are martyrs. Nor has the martyr spirit ceased, any
more than the martyr feeling. And if we are to have our portion
among the martyrs who yielded up their lives at the stake, and
died in earthly torment, we must carry in our bosom a martyr
spirit, and have the same feeling though we have not to endure
the same fate. This martyr spirit is expressed by the words "They
loved not their lives unto the death." They freely parted with their
lives sooner than deny the blessed Lord, or yield to the
accusations and suggestions of Satan. Naturally they loved their
lives as men must love them. But they did not love their lives so
as to love them more than salvation, more than grace, more than
the gospel for which they bled, and more than the Lord who died
for them. When death presented itself in its most terrible and
appalling forms they did not say, "I must, I will save my life. O
death, I fear thee! Sooner than die by cruel tortures, I will betray
my Lord, and give up all my religion. Life is so sweet to me and
death so terrible, that sooner than die I will renounce all I have
professed to believe, and will say, do, and be anything you wish."
The martyr spirit in their bosom prevented such a betraying of
Christ as that, whatever might await them in the shape of death.
Then you must have the same martyr spirit in your heart, though
not displayed in the same way, be willing to suffer for Christ's
sake, though not to be thrown to the wild beasts like the ancient
Christians, or die at the stake as our English martyrs. Come what
will, come what may, to feel a holy determination in Christ's
strength, not your own, never to give up the truth of God; but
feeling it dear to your soul, to hold it with all the power that God
may give, so that nothing shall ever tear it away from your
breast, even though life itself be at stake. If a man has ever felt
the truth of God in his heart as a heavenly blessing; if the mercy,
grace, love, presence, and power of God have ever been
experienced in his conscience, he will hold these divine realities to
be dearer to him than anything else—than wife, or children, or
land, or house, or possessions, or name, or fame, or reputation,
or character. In favoured moments, when the Lord Jesus Christ is
made precious to his soul, and his truth comes with liberating,
sanctifying power into his heart, nothing is so dear to him as the
truth of God. Now apply this to Satan's accusations, and see how
this martyr spirit of not loving our lives unto the death meets
them. It may be that he has accused you, among his other
charges, of insincerity and hypocrisy, of delusion, deception; that
what you know you merely know in the letter; that what you
have felt has been felt only in the flesh; and that what you have
received has not been received by the power of God into a
believing heart, but naturally and notionally into an enlightened
judgment. These insinuations and accusations are very
staggering, for there is a measure of truth in them, our carnal
mind being really and truly all that Satan accuses us of. But in
spite of all this, where the grace of God is in the heart there is an
inward determination not to yield to these accusations, but to
hold fast by the truth of God and what we have felt of its power,
come what will. This is the martyr spirit; for as the martyrs would
not give up what they believed at the command of their
persecutors, so we will not, and cannot give up what we have
believed and felt at the accusations of Satan. This was the
martyrs' last stand; here they fought for eternal life; here they
resisted unto blood; here they yielded up their breath sooner
than deny Christ; and here by dying for Christ they won Christ,
for here they proved the truth of his own words, "For whosoever
will save his life shall lose it: and whosoever will lose his life for
my sake shall find it." (Matt. 16:25.) In the same spirit must we
resist, and by resisting overcome the accusations of Satan. "Hold
that fast which thou hast that no man take thy crown," must be
our motto and watchword. Have you not at times felt in your
bosom that, come what will, you never can forget and never can
give up what the Lord has sealed upon your breast with power;
that his truth has been at various times made very precious to
you; that a measure of his love has been shed abroad in your
heart; and that Christ has discovered himself to your soul as "the
chiefest among ten thousand and the altogether lovely?" To this
felt experience of the power and truth of God, you look in life and
death; upon this blessed Jesus as revealed to your soul you hang
your only hope; from this discovery of salvation through his blood
and love, you derive your chief consolation in this vale of tears,
and in the strength of it, and in the renewed manifestation of it,
you hope and wish to die. Christ at hand, not far off; salvation in
your soul, not in the bare letter of the word; the work and
witness of the Holy Spirit in your conscience, not in the Scriptures
only; the presence, the smiles, the pardoning love of God
inwardly enjoyed; these divine realities will alone make your
death-bed happy. How, then, can you surrender at Satan's call
what you have felt, tasted, and handled for yourself of the word
of life? Armed in this armour of proof, you can stand against the
wiles of the devil. Satan, with all his accusations of slips and falls,
darkness, coldness, rebellion, ingratitude, unbelief, and his
numerous other pleas, whether true or false, cannot really
sustain a single charge against a saint whose heart God has made
true and honest, and in whose soul he has wrought by his holy
Spirit any measure of gracious, living experience; for he, having
the martyr spirit, loves the truth, from what he has known and
felt of its power, above everything. And sooner than part with
that he will part with his natural life.

Just observe, then, how the saint of God meets Satan when he
accuses him before God day and night. Look at the three
weapons that God has given him wherewith to fight the accuser
of the brethren, and see how, by the use of these three weapons,
he comes off more than conqueror. First, he looks to the atoning
blood of the Lamb, as shed upon Calvary's tree, revealed to his
soul by the power of God as cleansing from all sin, and sprinkled
upon his conscience by a divine operation. He looks to that
atoning blood as his chief, his only hope, and under a believing
view of it, can say, "Satan, I acknowledge I am a sinner, and one
of the worst and vilest, yea, of sinners the very chief; but here I
build my hope. The blood of Jesus Christ cleanseth from all sin. I
am baser and blacker than you have represented or can
represent me, but washed in that precious blood I can stand
before God accepted in the beloved." Then he can say, as
favoured with faith to employ the second weapon, "Here is the
word of God's testimony, the power of which I have felt in my
heart. It is God's word, and what God has said must be fulfilled.
If God has declared that he has loved me with an everlasting
love, that word will stand. If God has assured me, or gives me
any sweet evidence, that I am one of his children, his testimony
will stand in spite of all your accusations. If the Lord has loved
me, has given Himself for me, and has drawn me with cords of
love because he has so loved me, his love will stand firm and
fast, for those whom he loveth he loveth unto the end, whatever
charges may be brought against me of what I am and have been
in myself. And as to all else, let all go except what God has done
for my soul. Let health, let strength, let property, let substance,
let name and fame and character and reputation all go: they are
not my life, they are not my hope, they are not my all. Sooner
than part with the Lord Jesus Christ, give up my hope and sink in
despair,—sooner than do that, I will make my last sacrifice, I will
yield up my natural life." Thus by looking to the atoning blood of
the Lamb, holding fast the word of God's testimony, and being
possessed of a martyr spirit to hold to Christ even though death
itself were to ensue,—by these three weapons the saints whom
Satan accused before God day and night were able to overcome
him; and by these three weapons and the right use of them do
the saints overcome him now.

III.—And now, to come to our third and last point, as these

martyrs thus spoke and acted, the approbation of God himself
sounded from above, "And I heard a loud voice saying in
heaven"—as though God himself, witnessing the bloody conflict
here below, hearing Satan's accusations and how the saints of
God were able to meet and overcome them, spoke from heaven
itself with his own approving voice, "Now is come salvation, and
strength, and the kingdom of our God, and the power of his
Christ: for the accuser of our brethren is cast down, which
accused them before our God day and night." Whilst they were
engaged in the conflict; whilst Satan was accusing and pressing
his charges, and they were only just able to meet him with the
weapons put into their hand, fighting and struggling as dying
men, saving thereby their lives as they were losing them,
salvation had not come in all its blessedness, fulness, and power.
But when the accuser was cast down; when baffled and defeated
and driven out of his attempted conquest he slunk away as a
conquered foe, then salvation began to open itself in all its
blessed reality, in all its fulness, its certainty, and its glory. It is
after temptations, battles, conflicts, and God enabling us to get
the victory over them, that the fulness and blessedness of God's
salvation are seen. Salvation then becomes a reality—not a mere
truth in God's inspired word; not a mere doctrine floating in the
brain, or an article of a sound creed written down in the church
book; but a solid reality as revealed to the soul by the power of
God.

1. "Now is come salvation:" as though the believing soul should

now say, "Before this conflict, this struggle for life, this fight with
Satan, I saw salvation at a distance; but now, O now, salvation is
come! It has come into my heart as a blessed reality. I now know
that I am saved by the power of God; for Satan, who has been
accusing me before the throne day and night in my guilty
conscience, in my troubled, labouring breast, is cast down and
cast out; he no longer exercises the same influence and power to
harass and distress my soul; my conscience no longer bleeds
under his accusations. I have gained the victory through the
blood of the Lamb, and now is come salvation in all its
blessedness." See, then, the profit you have reaped from these
accusations. Not only have they sifted you out of all your false
religion and winnowed away the chaff and dust of a mere
profession, but, no thanks to Satan, they have been followed with
the richest blessing. But for the conflict there would have been no
victory, but for the battle no triumph, but for the defeated, flying
enemy no erecting of the trophy on the battlefield. It may seem
hard to you to have been forced against your will into the battle-
field, and have Satan accusing you day and night; but what
lessons you have there learnt, lessons to be learnt in no other
way! Before, you were a volunteer, learning the goose-step or
firing at a target. Now you are a soldier shouting victory over the
invading foe. As naturally, so spiritually, how can there be a
victory without a battle? But in the spiritual battle we do not fight
in our own strength, but in the Lord's; and if this be the case,
what can a man know of strength—the strength of Christ made
perfect in weakness—who has not been engaged in the battle-
field? When Satan accuses, then is felt our weakness, weakness
to answer his charges, weakness to fight in this bloody field, and
the soul is ready to sink and fall beneath the weight of the
accusations. But when the Lord strengthens us to look to the
blood of the Lamb, to wield the sword of the Spirit, and endues
us with a martyr spirit, then strength comes, strength to fight
and strength to win the victory; strength to baffle Satan's
accusations, and strength to shout triumph over the retreating
foe.

2. "And the kingdom of our God," which is the kingdom of Christ

set up in the heart, and righteousness, and peace, and joy in the
Holy Ghost; for Christ then reigns and rules in the soul. When he
has cast down Satan, when he has answered his charges, when
he has won the victory and defeated the enemy, then "the
kingdom of God "comes, as set up in the heart by divine power;
that kingdom which is to be erected upon the ruins of all other
kingdoms; that kingdom of grace here which will issue in the
kingdom of glory hereafter. Must not Christ now be King? Who so
fit, who so worthy to reign? Who so worthy to wear the crown of
glory? But whilst Satan still accused, the kingdom of Christ
though begun was not fully come. Till the stone cut out of the
mountain without hands smites the image and makes it like the
chaff of the summer threshing floors, it does not become a great
mountain to fill the whole earth. (Dan. 2:34, 35.) So till Satan is
cast down in the soul as well as in the world the kingdom of
Christ is not fully come.

3. And then comes "the power of his Christ," or of his anointed

one. Christ has received power at God's right hand to fight our
battles and plead our cause; for "all power is given unto him in
heaven and in earth." (Matt. 28:18.) And when this power is
experimentally put forth to deliver the soul from the accusations
of Satan, the shout from heaven is heard, "Now is come the
power of his Christ—his power as the anointed King of Zion."
Then is felt the power of his blood to cleanse a guilty conscience;
the power of his righteousness to justify a needy, naked soul; the
power of his love to bring it off more than conqueror; the power
of his Spirit to testify within to its adoption and its acceptance.
"The power of his Christ" is then experimentally felt when
salvation and strength and the kingdom of God are fully come.
And all these are fully come when the accuser is cast down and
victory obtained by the blood of the Lamb.

It is, then, through these trials, temptations, and conflicts that we

come into the experience and drink into the spirit of vital
godliness. As long as you are unexercised in your soul, have no
accusations of Satan, no temptations without or conflicts within,
you do not experimentally know the weight and power of vital
godliness, the realities of true religion, and the treasures of love
and grace locked up in the Person and work of the Son of God,
and revealed in the gospel of his grace. But put you in the battle-
field; let your soul hang trembling in the balance; let Satan come
in as the accuser of the brethren, and you sink into guilt, fear,
and despondency: then you will want something more than a
notional, natural faith and a little outside, superficial coat of
religion. You will want salvation spoken to your heart, strength
communicated to your soul, the kingdom of God set up in your
breast, and the power of his Christ made known in your
conscience. And if favoured with the enjoyment of these divine
realities after a season of anxiety and sorrow, you will see the
goodness of God in putting you into the furnace, in suffering
Satan to accuse you day and night, that when he is cast down
and overcome, the kingdom of God might come in its blessed
fulness, and be set up and established with more power and life
and unction in your heart. It seems very discouraging to many a
dear child of God to be exercised with guilt and temptation, and
to have Satan whispering these horrible charges. But when the
soul is enabled by the power of God to fight him with the
weapons that God has appointed, and which he puts into his
hand; and when through his all-sufficient and all-conquering
grace, victory is gained, and salvation, and strength, and the
kingdom of God, and the power of his Christ are come, then there
is felt to be a solemn reality in true religion that no heart before
could conceive or tongue express. Thus the favoured among you
in this congregation are not those who are at ease in Zion. It is
not those who are at peace with sin and Satan that are the highly
favoured, but those in the battle-field, fighting hand to hand with
the accuser of the brethren, often cast down, but never really
overcome, struggling hard, and at times despairing even of life,
yet holding on their way and in the end obtaining the victory.

I leave it in the hand of the Lord to apply to your heart what I

have spoken in his name, that it may be a searching word to
some and a comforting word to others; that it may pull down the
mighty from their seat and exalt the humble and meek; that it
may be a means in the hand of God to convince some poor
professor of the emptiness of his religion, or of dropping
consolation into the conscience of a troubled saint; that, with the
help of God, it may bring down as well as build up; and that I
may thus be the mouth of God, as well as the servant of God,
and speak words that the Holy Ghost may crown with his
approbation and his favouring smile.
THE ACCUSER OF THE BRETHREN OVERCOME AND CAST
DOWN

Preached on Lord's Day Morning, August 15, 1852, at Eden Street

Chapel, Hampstead Road

"And I heard a loud voice saying in heaven. Now is come

salvation, and strength, and the kingdom of our God, and the
power of his Christ; for the accuser of our brethren is cast down,
which accused them before our God day and night. And they
overcame him by the blood of the Lamb, and by the word of their
testimony; and they loved not their lives unto the death."
Revelation 12:10, 11

The prophetical portions of God's word admit, for the most part,
of a twofold interpretation—one literal and historical, the other
spiritual and experimental. It would seem, at first sight, that the
former was the more easy to understand. But it is not so. Great
difficulties usually beset the literal interpretation; and besides
that it requires more research and study than most persons can
give to the subject, the most intelligent commentators have been
puzzled to make it so square in all points with history and
chronology, as to furnish a distinct, coherent meaning. But of the
spiritual and experimental interpretation every child of God in a
measure, carries in his own bosom the key; and, therefore, the
intricate wards of this lock, a very Chubb or Bramah to mere
literal commentators, he can in many cases turn with
comparative facility. Yet these two interpretations are very
closely connected—the spiritual being based upon the literal; so
that we must in some measure be able to understand the literal
interpretation before we can fully enter into the spiritual. With
God's blessing, therefore, I shall devote a few moments this
morning to a brief literal explanation of the verses preceding the
text before I enter into the spiritual meaning of the words before
us.
"There appeared," we read, "a great wonder in heaven." The
heaven here spoken of is not heaven in its usual sense—that is,
the glorious mansion of God—but the mystical heaven, what the
Lord calls (Matt. 13) "the kingdom of heaven," that is, the
dispensation of the gospel, the kingdom of grace and mercy set
visibly up on the day of Pentecost. In this mystical heaven there
appeared "a woman clothed with the sun, the moon under her
feet, and upon her head a crown of twelve stars." The woman
thus gloriously arrayed represents the primitive and apostolic
church as shining forth in the dispensation of the gospel, bright
and beauteous. She stands clothed with Christ's righteousness,
the dispensation which had passed away being under her feet,
and crowned with the preaching of the gospel in its apostolic
purity.

But she is represented as "being with child, and crying out as

one travailing in birth." This signifies the soul travail of the
primitive church for the manifestation of Christ to the world; that
his grace and glory might be spread abroad; and he be brought
forth as the Son of God to be believed in and adored by all
nations—anticipating, as it were, in desire the millennial day. It
has no reference to Christ's birth of the Virgin Mary, but to the
bringing forth of Jesus in the glorious gospel, and to the full
acknowledgment of his resurrection whereby he was declared to
be the Son of God with power.

But there appeared another wonder in the mystical heaven—"A

great red dragon having seven heads and ten horns, and seven
crowns upon his heads." This represents Rome pagan—or rather
Satan using the pagan Roman empire as a means of opposing the
propagation of the gospel. The seven heads and ten horns with
the seven crowns, represent the power of Rome Imperial. Nor
were these persecutions without effect—"His tail drew away the
third part of the stars of heaven, and cast them to the earth," this
being the effect of the persecution of Rome pagan in causing
many who seemed to be stars in the heaven of the church, by
persecution to prove apostates. But the dragon "stands before
the woman which was about to be delivered, to devour the man
child as soon as it is born." This represents the attempts of Rome
Pagan to destroy the gospel by persecution, and to swallow up all
profession and acknowledgment of the Lord Jesus. But "she
brings forth the man child." All the efforts of Pagan Rome are
ineffectual—Christ is brought forth and is made manifest by the
preaching of the gospel in its apostolic purity.

But he does not come forth in all his glory. "The child is caught up
unto God and to his throne;" to signify, not the resurrection of
Christ, but the hiding of the grace and glory of the Lord Jesus in
the bosom of God, and to shew that the full manifestation of
Christ to the Gentiles is in the future. The woman flees to the
wilderness. The church of God, instead of a triumphant, becomes
a suffering church. Christ is hidden in the bosom of God from the
world, and made known only to a suffering remnant. The church
becomes a hidden church in the wilderness, where she is to be
fed for a thousand two hundred and threescore days, or years,
that is, maintained by the word and Spirit of God, during the
1,260 years other suffering condition.

Now comes "war in heaven;" not in the glorious abodes above.

There can be no war there. There never has been, never could be
battle and confusion in the realms of light, love, and bliss—as
Milton represents; but in the mystical heaven in the spread and
propagation of the gospel, there is and ever was strife between
the powers of light and darkness. "Michael and his angels"
represent the power of God in spreading the truth, "and the
dragon and his angels" represent the power of Satan, chiefly
shewn in opposing the spread of the gospel and the downfall of
paganism. They fight, but the dragon "prevailed not;" the gospel
wins the day; Christ is stronger than Satan. "And the great
dragon was cast out, that old serpent, called the Devil, and
Satan, which deceiveth the whole world: he was cast out into the
earth, and his angels were cast out with him." This represents the
triumph of the gospel over all the arts and malice of Satan, as
displayed in the persecutions under the Pagan emperors.
Connected with this casting down of Satan from his pride of
place, where he and his angels had been worshipped under the
guise of Pagan deities, come the words of the text—"I heard a
loud voice saying in heaven, Now is come salvation, and strength,
and the kingdom of our God, and the power of his Christ: for the
accuser of our brethren is cast down, which accused them before
our God day and night. And they overcame him by the blood of
the Lamb, and by the word of their testimony; and they loved not
their lives unto the death."

Pursuing the same train of prophetical events, the text, taken in

its literal acceptation, is, therefore, a prophecy of the sufferings
of the ancient martyrs under the Pagan persecutions, and of their
victory over all the malice of Satan. This victory they gained, not
by their own strength, but by the blood of the Lamb, by the word
of their testimony, and the free yielding up of their lives which
they loved not unto death—preferring death with all its torments
to denying their Lord and Master. The blood of the martyrs thus
became the seed of the church; and victory over paganism was
obtained not by doing, but by suffering; not by living, but by
dying; not by fleshly works, but by faith in the blood of the Lamb,
and faithfully adhering to the word of their testimony which had
been made precious to their souls. This is, as far as I understand
it, the literal interpretation of the chapter in connection with the
text. Upon this, as I before hinted, is based the spiritual and
experimental meaning to which we now come, and to which I
shall chiefly confine myself.

Three features seem most prominent in the words before us.

I. The casting down of the accuser of the brethren.

II. The means whereby the victory was gained over him.

III. The blessed consequences of the victory.

I. Satan is here represented as the "accuser of the brethren."

Satan does not "accuse" the world; he leaves it alone. Whilst a
man is under his power and dominion, he will not molest or
frighten him. Nay, so far from accusing such he will rather excuse
them. He will palliate sin in every possible way before committed,
to make it more readily indulged; and will excuse it after, to blunt
the stings of remorse. But of "the brethren," the people of God,
Satan is the unwearied, inveterate, unrelenting accuser.

He is said, here, to "accuse them before God day and night."

This does not mean that Satan has access into the presence of
God, to plead against his children before the Most High, as
though he was ever standing at the right hand of God, in the
realms of eternal bliss, and there and then accusing the bride of
Jesus. Satan in heaven! That foul spirit in the mansions of
holiness! That fiend of darkness in the light which no man can
approach unto! No. We cannot admit that, except in a mystical
manner, as in the opening chapters of Job and in the vision of
Micaiah. But the meaning is, that when the saints come before
God, then and there he accuses them. This we find true in soul
experience. Be engaged in your lawful calling, have no thought of
God or godliness, Satan is quiet; he does not then accuse you.
But be in the presence of God, come before him, as we read of
David, that "he went and sat before the Lord," then Satan begins
to accuse. There are six different sacred employments in which
we may be said "to sit before the Lord;" secret prayer—
worshipping in God's tabernacles—reading the Scriptures-
communing with our own heart—conversing with the people of
God—and partaking of the Lord's Supper. In each and all of these
does Satan fulfil this malignant office of accusing the brethren.

1. But an accuser must have a spot whereon to stand, a court

wherein he may lay his charges. This court is the court of
conscience. There he brings his charges; there he files his
pleas; there he exercises all his malicious eloquence and all his
powers of argument to bring in the sentence "guilty of death."
But without pleas an accuser is powerless. The eloquence of an
advocate is nothing unless sustained by proofs. The accuser of
the brethren is not wanting here. His pleas he arranges under two
heads; and accuses the brethren sometimes as law sinners, and
sometimes as gospel sinners. But it is worthy of observation that
Satan's charges are not random accusations. They are always
based upon truth. This gives them force and edge. It is true that
"when he speaketh a lie he speaketh of his own, for he is a liar
and the father of it;" but there is this peculiarity in Satan's lies—
that there is truth for their basis. Have you never observed this in
worldly things? For a slander to obtain currency there must be
some truth in it. A complete, thorough falsehood has no legs to
stand upon; to run abroad and to enter into house after house, it
must have limbs of truth, though head and body be a lie. Base
coin must be gilt and look like good, or none will take it. Trashy
articles must have a surface put upon them, or nobody will
purchase them. So Satan comes with a groundwork of truth. If he
had no word of truth in his lips he could have no hold upon the
conscience. Thus when the law seizes the sinner by the throat,
and says, "Pay me that thou owest," Satan takes up its heavy
charges, puts poignancy into them, and urges them with
vehemence upon the conscience. Here is his main strength. When
the Law pours out its curses, and the sentence of death
connected with disobedience to it enters into the conscience, the
soul under that sentence must fall down before it, must plead
guilty. The charges are so true, and so backed by the authority of
God, that there is no denying or getting away from them. Here
then is the ground of truth on which Satan plants his foot. "You
know," says he, "that you have broken the Law; that you have
never loved the Lord your God with all your heart and soul, and
mind, and strength, nor your neighbour as yourself. Look at the
breadth and spirituality, the claims and extent, the holiness and
perfection of the Law, reaching to the thoughts and intents of the
heart; and see the awful curse attached to every man who
continueth not in all points to observe it in heart, lip, and life. But
you have broken it again and again, in thought, word, and deed."
All this is true, most true; and the accusation, therefore, cannot
be denied nor evaded. But on this groundwork of truth comes
Satan's lying conclusion—"For you there is no hope; despair must
be your everlasting portion. A sinner like you never can be
forgiven. The Law of God curses you; and under that curse you
will surely lie to all eternity." When suffering under these
accusations, the difficulty is to distinguish between the voice of
God and the voice of Satan; because the accuser of the brethren
imitates the voice of God, and thus takes up and backs the
sentence pronounced by the Lord's mouth. But herein is the
enemy discovered that from true premises he draws false
conclusions. Here Satan's cloven loot is detected. Because you
have broken God's Law, and because it curses you, are you to be
eternally lost? Satan says, yes; but God says, no. God applies the
Law to bring you out of self-righteousness; Satan urges the Law
to drive you to despair. God sends it into your conscience to
bring, you to Christ; Satan sounds its threatenings to bring you to
blaspheme; God condemns you by it to save you eventually into
heaven; Satan condemns you by it to hurl your soul into hell.

2. But Satan can, and does accuse the brethren of sins against
the gospel, as well as of sins against the law. When the Lord has
spoken a measure of peace to the conscience, given the soul
deliverance from law charges, and enabled it to receive the love
of the truth, and to taste, in faith and feeling, something of the
sweetness of the gospel, Satan is so far baffled. He slinks away.
But he has not exhausted his quiver, nor parted with all his stock.
Like an Old Bailey lawyer, he knows all the quirks and quillets of
the law; and his tongue sometimes smooth and oily, sometimes
loud and thundering, whispering one while like a serpent, and
roaring at another like a lion, can plead that white is black and
black is white, to suit his purposes and confuse the soul. When,
then, after a taste of the Lord's goodness and mercy, we depart
from him, Satan brings his gospel charges. It is unhappily too
true that after received mercy, when the Lord has in some
measure withdrawn his gracious presence, the soul backslides
from him, grows cold and lifeless, perhaps even slips into some
inconsistency, and says or does something that makes sad work
in the conscience. Through this breach Satan enters, and lays his
accusations. "If you were a child of God, you could not have
acted so. No one who had tasted that the Lord was gracious ever
departed from him as you have done. They are all kept; for 'He
keepeth the feet of his saints.' You therefore cannot be one. You
are a gospel sinner, whose doom is more dreadful than a law
sinner. The hottest place in hell is for hypocrites like you."

Such and similar are Satan's accusations; and as I before hinted,

so far based upon truth that the charges themselves cannot be
denied. It is in the conclusions which Satan draws that the
falsehood lies. There is the serpent hiss. Yield not then to Satan's
conclusions. Admit the charge; for that is too clear to be denied;
plead guilty;—that we must ever do; but do not yield to his
conclusions, and cast away your hope. Because we have slipped,
have backslidden, have neglected and forsaken the God of all our
mercies, have in many things sadly erred, listened too often to
the tempter, and walked too much after our idols, is there no
hope? Surely this is not true. Therefore, I say, admit all Satan's
accusations, but do not admit his conclusions. You have not
rejected nor despised the gospel, counted the blood of the
covenant an unholy thing, nor done despite to the Spirit of grace.
You may be a backslider, but are not a gospel sinner.

Remember too that it is before God that Satan accuses the

brethren. When acting inconsistently he does not accuse them;
but when they return to the Lord with weeping and supplications,
then he pleads against them all their filthiness and folly. See this
in the case of Joshua the high priest. It was when he was
standing before the angel of the Lord that Satan stood at his right
hand to resist him. {Zec 3:1} He pointed, doubtless, to the
smoke of the fire of temptation which had blackened the brand,
and to the filthy garments in which he stood clothed. There was
truth in the charge. He was a blackened brand; but the Lord had
snatched him half burnt through from the fire; he was clothed
with filthy ragments; but the command was, "Take away the
filthy garments from him," Thus was Satan baffled, confounded,
and put to flight.

II. But we find that the blessed saints and martyrs of old were
enabled to overcome this accuser of the brethren. The accuser of
the brethren was cast down. His feet slipped and fell.
"He fled, and with him fled the shades of night." The
brethren gained the victory. But how? "And they overcame him
by the blood of the Lamb, and by the word of their
testimony; and they loved not their lives unto the death."

The weapons which the Holy Ghost put into their hands, and gave
them strength to wield, were three

1. The Blood of the Lamb

2. The Word of their Testimony—and

3. The Spirit of Martyrdom.

The saints and martyrs did not overcome Satan by denying his
charges: that they could not do, for their consciences compelled
them to admit their truth. This gave Satan such firm ground; for
who can stand against the verdict of his own conscience? Nor did
they overcome him by pleading their weakness against sin, and
their inability to resist temptation. Nor did they vanquish him by
alleging the force of example in others; nor by palliating their
guilt as comparatively small; nor by promising reformation
present or future; nor by quoting God's decrees as necessarily
influencing their conduct. They well knew that Leviathan would
count such darts as stubble, and would laugh at the shaking of
such a spear. All such iron he would esteem as straw, and all
such brass as rotten wood. They dropped, therefore, all such
carnal, useless weapons, and betook themselves to those alone
which they knew would obtain for them the victory.

i. The first was, "The blood of the Lamb." How was this weapon
effectual? Because the blood of the Lamb proclaims pardon and
peace; and therefore sweeps away Satan's conclusion, that the
accused being guilty, condemnation must necessarily follow.

The expression, "They overcame him by the blood of the Lamb,"

implies that it was a weapon in their hands, firmly wielded in their
grasp. When David overcame the champion of the Philistines by a
sling and a stone, the sling was not hanging up in the sheepcote,
nor was the pebble lying in the bed of the brook. It was not the
blood of the Paschal lamb in the basin, but sprinkled on the lintel
and side posts, which preserved Israel in Egypt from the
destroying angel. Thus it is not the blood of the Lamb as revealed
in the word of God, but as applied to, and sprinkled on the
conscience which answers the accusations of Satan. But we may
observe that there is our coming unto the blood of sprinkling, and
there is the blood of sprinkling coming unto us. The apostle
speaks (Heb. 12:22, 24), "Ye are come to the blood of sprinkling,
which speaketh better things than that of Abel." This coming to
the blood is the first step in gaining the victory.

In Christian warfare, defeat generally, if not always, precedes

conquest. It is not therefore so easy to overcome sin, death, and
hell, which are all striving against us; and usually we never look
to the right quarter for help until well nigh all hope is gone. The
first gleam generally comes from a view of the blood of the Lamb,
if I may use the expression, in the distance. The lighthouse casts
its glimmering rays far over the wide waste of waters to guide
into harbour the storm-tossed mariner. So when there is a view
in the soul of the blood of the Lamb even at a distance, it is a
beacon light which draws towards it the eyes and heart of those
who are doing business in deep waters. The light that shines may
not at first be very bright or clear; but it is a day star heralding
the rising of the sun. The blessed Spirit shines upon the word,
and raises up faith in the soul to believe that the Lamb has been
slain, that blood has been shed, that a sacrifice has been offered,
and that a new and living way has been opened and consecrated,
through the veil—the rent flesh of the Lord Jesus. This affords the
accused soul some foothold, on which it can stand, and return an
answer to Satan's accusations. "True," it says, "I am a guilty
wretch. I am a sinner, and the chief of sinners; for I have sinned
against light, against convictions, against conscience, and the
fear of God. My heart is altogether evil, my mind wholly corrupt,
and my nature utterly depraved. I have never done any one good
thing. I am a wretch, and the worst of wretches; and I can never
say anything too bad of myself nor others of me. But with all
that, the Lamb of God hath shed his precious blood, and that
blood—cleanseth from all sin." "When the enemy comes in like a
flood, the Spirit of the Lord," we read, "shall lift up a standard
against him." The standard which he lifts up is the blood-stained
flag of the crucified Redeemer. To come for refuge and shelter
under this banner dipped in blood, is to make head against
Satan's accusations.

Still the victory is not fully gained. It is only when there is a

coming of the blood into the heart, a sprinkling of it on the
conscience, a manifestation and application of it to the soul that
Satan is effectually put to flight. "They conquered him by the
blood of the Lamb;" but he was not effectually put to the rout till
he saw the blood on the conscience, as the angel of death saw in
Egypt the blood on the lintel.

ii. But they had another weapon—"The word of their

testimony."

This, I believe, is the word that God had put into their heart. It is,
therefore, called "the word of their testimony," because truly and
emphatically theirs. It is not called the word of the testimony,
nor the word of God's testimony, but "the word of their
testimony." The sword in the Tower is not the soldier's, but the
sovereign's. When put into the warrior's hand, it is for the first
time his. The martyr's sword was not a text, but a testimony; not
a quotation nor a parallel passage, but a word from God's mouth.
As thus made theirs, they could use this word as a testimony
against Satan. Thus every sweet promise which comes with
power to the soul; every encouraging word; every token for
good; every beam of hope, or ray of mercy which shoots athwart
the black clouds of despondency into the heart, is an answer to
Satan's accusations. This is "the sword of the Spirit, which is the
word of God;" not a sword sheathed, but a sword bare and
naked, ready for use. The word which God is pleased to speak to
your soul is the grand weapon which you must never give up.
Satan will accuse you of every sin; and when he has got you
down, he would soon make an end of you if God did not interfere
and succour you. He knows where to hit us. We have most of us
weak points, where a slight blow tells, much more a heavy one. A
besetting sin, or a prevailing infirmity, or a former inconsistency,
or an experience defective in some particular, or an unbelieving
frame, are in grace what a weak limb or asthmatic lungs are in
nature. Satan directs his artillery where the fortress is most
assailable. Do you never hear the hissing of his red-hot shot?
"Can the fear of God be in your soul when you are so much like
the world? Why did you ever make a profession? Would it not
have been better for you to have been altogether in the world
than to act as you have acted? Look at your daily walk and
conversation; what a poor, barren, stupid wretch you are! You
are now almost asleep, sitting there without life or feeling. It is
true when you get into trials you begin to rouse up and call upon
God; but this is no mark of grace, for the ungodly we read, call
upon God when distress and anguish come upon them." How then
are these cruel charges to be met? Thus; "It is true; I admit it all;
and I am worse than you can make or paint me. But has not God
spoken this and that word to my soul? Did he not give me this or
that promise? Have I not had this and that manifestation of the
Lord Jesus Christ? Did I not hear with power on that memorable
day, when my heart was so broken and melted? Did not tears of
mingled joy and sorrow gush forth from my eyes, and gladness,
blended with contrition, fill my heart?"

When the word of God is thus believed, laid hold of, and firmly
abided by at all risks and hazards, it brings victory. Thus the
martyrs lived and died. They threw away all weapons but the
word of God, the power of which they had felt in their conscience.
This they handled and wielded, as the life-guardsman handles
and wields his own sword. He is not at home with any other. The
handle from use fits his hand as if the two grew together. So
must the promises and truth of God be felt to be your own, if you
are to use them effectually against your adversary. You cannot
fight Satan with any other weapon; for you cannot hold it firmly
enough. A twist of his blade will knock out of your hand texts
picked up at random. What is taken up in presumption is usually
laid down in despair.
But suppose the Lord has not done very much for your soul, nor
given you great manifestations or promises. Still, if he has ever
spoken one word to your heart, it is a testimony, and this you
must use as you best can. Oh! How helpless is the soul without it!
when there is not a single testimony of the fear or love of God
being in the heart! It is like a life-guardsman at Waterloo, with a
broken arm, ready to be cut down by a French cuirassier. Unless
the blood of the Lamb be sprinkled upon the warrior's breast, and
the sword of his testimony be in the warrior's hand, he stands
naked before his enemy, as the children of Israel in the days of
Saul, when neither sword nor spear was found in the hand of any
of the people that followed him.

iii. But they had another weapon still, the mention of which is a
special allusion to the ancient martyrs—"They loved not their
lives unto the death!" This weapon we may call therefore the
spirit of martyrdom. Now, in what does that spirit consist? In
total self-renunciation. How did the martyrs die in Smithfield?
We read in Fox's Book of Martyrs that many men, women, and
even children died in those burning flames in triumph. But did
they come to those flames in their own strength or
righteousness? No! They went all weakness and helplessness; but
relying upon the power of God, they renounced all earthly things
for his name's sake, even life itself: "They loved not their lives
unto the death." They parted with name, fame, worldly goods, life
itself, and counted it as nothing in comparison with the truth of
God and the profession of his glorious gospel. Such times may
come again; and if so, there will doubtless be similar witnesses—
in themselves all weakness, but in Christ all strength.

But the Roman amphitheatre in Pagan, and Smithfield in Popish

persecutions, are not the only spots and places where the spirit of
martyrdom has been displayed. There is another arena—the
Christian's heart. We must carry in our bosom the spirit of
martydom, just as much as though we were called upon to die at
the stake. The Lord Jesus said, "He that findeth his life shall lose
it: and he that loseth his life for my sake shall find it;" {Mt
10:39} and again, "If any man come to me, and hate not his
father, and mother, and wife and children, and brethren, and
sisters, yea and his own life also, he cannot be my disciple."

This is the essence of martyrdom—to love not our lives unto the
death. Suffering does not make a martyr; for error has had its
victims as well as truth its witnesses. In this country, Papists and
Socinians, in China Jesuits, in Spain Jews, have been burnt to
ashes sooner than renounce their creed. It is suffering for truth,
for Jesus' sake, which makes the martyr. Many have a dogged
obstinacy, so that they would sooner die than yield, even where
they are clearly wrong. These are not martyrs but madmen.
Obstinacy in error only adds one sin to another. We must have
the martyr's spirit, though we may never die the martyr's death;
and that spirit is self-renunciation. Life is the dearest of all
possessions. If that be renounced, the rest is easy.

The renunciation of life implies the renunciation of self; and this

includes the renunciation of all creature strength, wisdom, and
righteousness. Look at the Smithfield martyrs. What creature
strength had they in the flame? what natural wisdom to answer
their accusers? what fleshly righteousness to stand in before
God? All that was of self and earth was renounced in renouncing
life. This baffled Satan. He thought the flames would make them
recant; and took advantage of threatened death to urge more
vehemently his accusations. What was their answer? That of the
three children who were cast by Nebuchadnezzar into the burning
fiery furnace. "I cannot give up the truth. I cannot deny the Lord.
Come heaven, come hell, I will not belie my conscience." This
was Satan's last assault. When he could not carry the city by
storm, he raised the siege. Have the martyr's spirit, and you will
win the martyr's victory.

III. This brings us to its blessed consequences. "And I heard a

loud voice saying in heaven, now is come salvation, and
strength, and the kingdom of our God, and the power of
his Christ." The loud voice denotes that there were witnesses of
this solemn conflict. "We are made a spectacle," says the apostle,
"unto the world, and to angels, and to men." We are not fighting
the battle without witnesses. As the apostle speaks in another
place; "Seeing we also are compassed about with so great a
cloud of witnesses, let us run with patience the race that is set
before us, looking unto Jesus the author and finisher of our faith."
A cloud of heavenly spectators surrounds the battle field,
watching with intense interest the struggle; and when Satan
flees, they lift up the victorious shout—"Now is come salvation,
and strength, and the kingdom of our God, and the power of his
Christ." These heavenly blessings had not "come" before—that is,
in clear, bright, undeniable manifestation. They were in the mind
of God, in his eternal purpose; but they had not come into visible
being, into inward and personal experience, into soul realization
and blessed enjoyment. It is in vain for the children of God to
expect a victory without a battle. Some people talk as if heaven
was to be obtained without a struggle; as if sin, Satan, the Law,
and conscience fled at the first charge, before a sword was
flushed or blood drawn. If shame could be known in heaven, a
blush might well spread over the face of such bloodless
combatants in the presence of the suffering Limb of God, and
before the martyrs and palm-bearing victors, who came out of
"great tribulation." One would think that even on earth they must
be mute during the singing of the heavenly anthem, "Now is
come salvation," &c., when they have known neither battle nor
victory.

But why "NOW?" Because till Satan was cast down and overcome,
these heavenly blessings were not come into the heart.

1. "Salvation," What salvation? Salvation by grace, full and

free; salvation without any intermixture of creature
righteousness; salvation gushing from the bosom of God;
salvation flowing wholly and solely through the blood of the
Lamb. But salvation never can be tasted unless there has been a
previous foretaste of condemnation. Heaven can never be looked
up into before there has been a looking down into the wicket gate
of hell. There must have been an experience of guilt before there
can be the enjoyment of pardon. "Now is come salvation." From
what? From the accusations of Satan, the curses of the law, the
fear of death, the terrors of hell, and sentence of damnation. And
how does salvation come? Whilst the battle is going on; whilst the
issue is doubtful; whilst hand to hand, foot to foot, and shoulder
to shoulder, Satan and the soul are engaged in deadly strife,
there is no felt experience of salvation. There may be hope; and
this enables the soldier to stand his ground; but there is no shout
of victory till the enemy is put to flight. But when Satan is
defeated, his accusations silenced, and the soul liberated, then is
"come salvation." The sweetest song that ever heaven
proclaimed, the most blessed note that ever melted the soul, is
"salvation." To be saved! saved from death and hell; saved from
the worm which dieth not, and the fire which is not quenched;
saved from the sulphurous flames of the bottomless pit; saved
from the companionship of tormenting fiends and of all the foul
wretches under which earth has groaned; saved from
blaspheming God in unutterable woe; saved from an eternity of
misery without end or hope! And saved into heaven! into the
sight of Jesus as he is; into perfect holiness and happiness; into
the blissful company of holy angels and glorified saints; and all
this during the countless ages of a blessed eternity! What tongue
of men or angels can describe the millionth part of what is
contained in the word "salvation?"

2. "And strength." There was no strength before, at least no felt,

realized, enjoyed strength. Sin was too strong, Satan too
powerful, his accusations too weighty, and the conscience too
guilty for the struggling soul to realize strength. When the soldier
in battle is bathed in sweat and blood, scarcely able from
weariness to move hand or foot, and his sword is only kept in his
hand by the blood and gore which glue them together, he fights
in weakness, unconscious of strength. So the soul, when fighting
with sin and Satan, fights on when ready to drop. It is all
weakness then. But with salvation comes "strength,"—strength to
believe, strength to hope, and strength to love, strength to bless
and praise the Lord, and shout victory over the flying foe. Then
there is strength to credit the promise and perform the precept;
to walk in the ways of God and submit to the will of God; and to
run the way of his commandments with an enlarged heart.

3. "And the kingdom of our God." This too was little known
before. The kingdom of God is an inward kingdom, and it is set
up in the heart of a people made willing in the day of his power.
It consists, therefore, in the dethroning of sin, Satan, and self,
and in the setting up of Jesus as sovereign of the heart and Lord
of the affections. Till Satan is cast out and the conscience
cleansed from his accusations, Jesus cannot sit upon his inward
throne. But with salvation to deliver, and strength to believe,
comes the kingdom of God; and Christ is crowned upon the battle
field—elevated like the kings of old upon the shields of the
conquerors.

4. And with this comes "the power of Christ." This all-mighty,

all-victorious power was not fully known before. How earnestly
did the apostle desire "to know Christ, and the power of his
resurrection;" how little is known of "the power of his Christ,"
what Christ has done, what Christ can do! But when salvation
comes, and strength, and the kingdom of God, then too is known
"the power of his Christ," his crucified Christ, his risen Christ, his
glorified Christ, his interceding Christ; of Christ at the right hand
of God, "King of kings and Lord of lords;" ruling, guiding,
directing, upholding all things in heaven and earth. This power
Christ often withholds for a time that the soul may learn its
weakness. When pressed hard with Satan's accusations, little
comparatively is known what Christ can do for the soul; how he
can repel Satan, answer every charge, fight its battles, and
support the fainting spirit. Till the enemy is fled, and the field of
battle gone over, his power is not often fully known. The number
of the slain reveals the fury of the foe. But this too makes known
the power of the Conqueror. "Who is this," asks the Church, "that
cometh from Edom with dyed garments from Bozrah? This that is
glorious in his apparel, travelling in the greatness of his
strength?" "I," answers the Lord, "that speak in righteousness,
mighty to save."
"Salvation, strength, the kingdom of God, and the power of his
Christ!" These are great things, blessed things. In them lies the
very marrow of vital godliness—the very essence of that religion
which God the Spirit sets up in the heart. But do you not observe
their close and intimate connexion with martyrdom and suffering?
Do not separate them. Do not think that the whole of religion
consists in reading, hearing, praying, and attending to the
ordinances of the gospel. All this is well; but salvation, and the
kingdom of God, and the power of his Christ are not tied to
outward observances.
O how mysterious is true religion! How supernatural! how
opposed to all preconceived ideas, or conclusions of the natural
mind! Should we not, left to ourselves, say, "this is religion, to
read God's word with undeviating regularity, to be very earnest in
prayer, to watch and strive against all our besetting sins, never in
the least degree to slip in thought, word, or deed, to do the best
in our power in all the relationships of life, and so go smoothly to
heaven." Let me not breathe a word against such things. They
are good as means, but dangerous as ends. They are not to be
left undone; but there is something far beyond them all. But is
this smooth, easy road to heaven God's way? Is it the path in
which the redeemed have ever walked? Those that know anything
of the kingdom of God have not found it so plain, easy, and
beaten a road. It certainly is not so mapped out in the words
before us. The blessed martyrs did not gain their victory upon
such easy terms. Theirs was not this smooth path, nor did they
walk in this flowery meadow. We read that they had an accuser
who accused them before God day and night. Is Satan in our day
less active? Is the heart of man better now than it was then? Has
God devised of late years some new road to heaven other than
that in which these blessed saints walked in their day and
generation? The Bible would not be true; the experience of God's
people would be false; the tears that they shed; the sighs they
heave; the cries, prayers, and groans that they pour forth for
deliverance, would be all so many fancies, whims of a heated
brain, not deep soul realities. If heaven were gained at so easy a
price, so facile a rate, heaven's courts would be filled with a
motley throng who had not learnt the song of Moses and the
Lamb. Half round the throne would be sufferers, and half would
be doers; martyrs singing praise to the Redeemer, and workers
chanting anthems to self. But have we any choice in this matter?
May I be a martyr, or a worker at discretion, selecting, ad
libitum, my own path. To come into it, or to walk in it, is not of
our own choice. It is all according to God's own eternal purpose.
He has appointed a certain path in which his children are to walk;
he takes their feet with his own hands, and puts them into the
path; and if they are diverging from it he puts them into it back
again. It is "through much tribulation we are to enter the
kingdom;" and he has never yet recalled that word.

There may be those here who are suffering under the accusations
of Satan so as sometimes to be almost without hope. All their
religion seems gone, and they have no firm ground to stand
upon. They feel to have so sinned against God, that it seems
impossible for him to forgive them. Now you may depend upon it,
that you are not travelling alone in this road, but have more
fellow-travellers than you are perhaps aware of. Then be not
dismayed if you find Satan or your own conscience—and you
cannot always distinguish between them accusing you before God
day and night. Cast not away your hope if in secret prayer you
feel a load of guilt upon your conscience. Be not dismayed if,
when you come before God, thousands of charges are brought
against you, and it seems almost presumptuous in you to open
your lips before him. See how these blessed martyrs were
accused, and yet they came off victorious? Their weapons must
be yours—"The blood of the Lamb, the word of their testimony,
and the loving not of their lives unto the death." Search and
examine well your experience. Have you never had some view of
the blood of the Lamb? Has it never been sprinkled on your
conscience? Have you not had some views of it by faith so as to
come unto it and hide your guilty soul under it? Have you never
come to "the blood of sprinkling" by faith? This was the first turn
of the fight. And has the Lord never spoken a word to your soul?
Have you never had a testimony in your conscience, been melted
in prayer, softened and blessed? Have you never had a sweet
promise dropped into your heart? Did not this give, whilst it
lasted, a measure of relief to your conscience, and in some
degree answer the cruel accusations of Satan? And have you not
renounced all your own righteousness, and felt willing to die if
you were sure of your interest in Christ? These were the weapons
whereby the martyrs conquered. We read nothing here of their
own righteousness, or consistency, or piety, or holiness, or
resolutions, or good words and works. Nothing is said to the high
praise and glory of self. The only three weapons here mentioned
are the blood of the Lamb, the word of their testimony, and the
spirit of martyrdom. And these three weapons are found more or
less in the armoury of every child of God.

But see if you cannot also trace victory as well as conflict. With
the blood of the Lamb, the word of their testimony, and the spirit
of martyrdom came salvation and strength, the kingdom of God,
and the power of his Christ. Have you not experienced a measure
of these blessings? The blood of the Lamb brings "salvation."
Have you not embraced salvation by grace as dear to your soul?
With salvation comes "strength." "In the day when I cried thou
answeredst me, and strengthenedst me with strength in my
soul." Ps 138:3 Have you not felt this? And "the kingdom of
our God." Have you never touched the sceptre and bowed down
at Jesus' feet as Lord of all? Been made willing to part with all
idols that he might reign supreme in your heart and affections?
And "the power of his Christ." Are you willing that Jesus should
take the reins of government, should manage you and yours,
should subdue your sins, fight your battles, and bring you off
more than conqueror? All these blessings are connected with, and
flow from the blood of the Lamb, the word of their testimony, and
the spirit of self-renunciation. Look not then to any other quarter
for help or hope; but trust wholly and solely to the Lord, who can
bring you through every trial and difficulty, and give you to live in
his glorious presence for ever.
THE AFFLICTED REMNANT AND THEIR CONFIDING
TRUST

Preached at Zoar Chapel, Great Alie Street. London, on Lord's

Day Morning, July 6, 1845

"I will also leave in the midst of thee an afflicted and poor people,
and they shall trust in the name of the Lord." Zeph. 3:12

Jerusalem was the centre of the worship of the only true God
from the day that David brought thither the ark (2 Sam. 6) until
she rejected the Lord of life and glory, and brought upon herself
that sentence, "Behold your house is left unto you desolate"
(Matt. 28:38). For this reason, Jerusalem became a type and
figure of two things: first, of the true church of God, his own
elect family; and secondly, of the visible church. In those
passages for instance, where we read, "Pray for the peace of
Jerusalem" (Ps. 122:6); "Put on thy beautiful garments, O
Jerusalem, the holy city" (Isa. 52:1); "Speak ye comfortably to
Jerusalem" (Isa. 40:2)—in these, and similar passages, Jerusalem
is addressed as representing the spiritual church of God. But, on
the other hand, there are many passages where she is spoken of
in language only applicable to the outward professing church; as
in the beginning of this chapter, "Woe to her that is filthy and
polluted, to the oppressing city!" (Zeph. 3:1).

In the text, we find Jerusalem personally addressed. And the Lord

declares that he "will leave in the midst of her an afflicted
and poor people;" and that this afflicted and poor people "shall
trust in the name of the Lord." By Jerusalem, then, in the
text, is not meant the true church of God, the inner sanctuary;
but the outer court, the visible church, as including the invisible.
And the Lord says of this professing church, of this outward
visible congregation, that he will leave in her midst, a circle within
a circle, a peculiar people, whom he describes under two distinct
marks.
In endeavouring to unfold this portion of God's word, I shall
notice three particulars connected with the text:

I.—The solemn declaration of the Almighty, that he will leave in

the midst of the professing church a people.

II.—The character of the people whom the Lord thus leaves in the
midst of Jerusalem, "an afflicted and poor people."

III.—That they shall be brought to "trust in the name of the

Lord."

I.—God here speaks in the solemn exercise of his sovereignty, "I

will leave." It is no matter of chance, or of uncertainty. It is a
solemn declaration, which God, who cannot lie, has given, and
which He will therefore surely fulfill.

But we may observe two things connected with this solemn

declaration: one is, "in the midst of her." The words clearly
intimate that "all are not Israel who are of Israel;" that the
outward court forms a bulwark to the inner; that the visible
church incloses in its bounds the invisible. Thus, we are to expect
to find the people of God in the midst of the professing church,
and yet completely separate from it; wrapped up in it, as the
kernel is wrapped up in the nut; yet as distinct in essence, in
peculiarity, and in flavour, as the kernel is from the shell which
surrounds it. It is also hidden by the professing church in the
same way as the kernel is hidden by the shell; and yet so hidden
that though the eye of man sees it not, yet it lies naked and open
before the eyes of him with whom we have to do.

But the expression, "I will leave," carries with it also a peculiar
signification. The Lord does not say, 'I will put in the midst of
her,' but 'I will leave in the midst of her.' The word is connected
with the idea of a remnant, as we read in the next verse, "The
remnant of Israel shall not do iniquity, nor speak lies; neither
shall a deceitful tongue be found in their mouth: for they shall
feed and lie down, and none shall make them afraid" (Zeph.
3:13) . The inner portion, therefore, bears a small proportion to
the outer: "two or three berries in the top of the uppermost
bough, four or five in the outmost fruitful branches thereof."

Now it will be the concern of every one taught of God to know

whether he belong to the outward, or to the inward church:
whether he be one of that peculiar people chosen before all
worlds, whom God leaves as a remnant in the midst of the
outward church, or whether he has the mere form of godliness,
while destitute of the power.

II.—And this leads me to the second branch of the subject, which

is to describe the spiritual character of this peculiar people left
as a remnant in the midst of professing Jerusalem: for the Lord in
his word, for the comfort of his people, has given signs and
marks by which they are peculiarly distinguished.

The Holy Spirit, in the text, has stamped these two marks upon
them: 1. that they are "an afflicted and poor people:" and 2.
that "they trust in the name of the Lord."

The first mark that he stamps upon them is, that they are "an
afflicted and poor people."

1. They are "an afflicted people." The Lord's people, in

common with the rest of mankind, have to drink of the cup of
temporal sorrow. This, then, is no distinguishing mark of their
being the people of God; for "Man is born to trouble, as the
sparks fly upward." But what is the effect of these temporal
afflictions upon them? Temporal afflictions, however long,
however deep, however aggravated, carry with them no evidence
that those on whom they fall belong to the peculiar people of
God; but the fruit and effect which spring out of these afflictions
bear a decisive stamp. When afflictions come upon the men of
this world, there is no sanctifying effect produced through them.

2. Affliction leaves them just as it found them. Did I say so? It

leaves them worse than it found them. Their hearts are hardened
rather than softened by the afflictions they are made to pass
through; and their troubles, instead of driving them to the Lord,
only serve to drive them farther and farther from him. They
thrust them into rebellion, or into the world, or more deeply into
sin, into suicide, or into despair. So that there is this marked
distinction between temporal afflictions as befalling the children
of men, and temporal afflictions as befalling the children of God—
that temporal afflictions leave the children of men just as they
were, in nature's darkness and in nature's death; whereas the
temporal afflictions that fall upon the people of God bring with
them a sanctifying and fertilizing effect. For instance:

Many of the Lord's people are afflicted in their bodies. In this

they share with the children of men at large. The wards of the
hospital, and the sick chamber, are not tenanted only by the
children of God: the men of this world have their share of bodily
afflictions. But bodily afflictions produce in the latter no spiritual
fruit. Sickness and pain do not, cannot change the heart. But the
bodily afflictions that God's people have to pass through, often
produce in them a sanctifying effect. When God blesses and
works by them, they separate us from the world: they bring
before us the solemn realities of eternity: they lead us to look
more narrowly how we stand before God; they purge out false
faith, false hope, false love; they sift our evidences to the very
centre; they bring us more into the presence of a heart-searching
God, that we may lay ourselves open before him; they embitter
sin to us; they bring death nearer to view; they quicken prayer;
they stir up a spirit of supplication in the heart. And in these
afflictions the Lord is at times pleased to manifest himself
peculiarly to the soul. Many a child of God on a sick bed has
found more of the presence and favour of the Lord than ever he
knew before; and has had reason to bless God to the latest
breath of his life that he had been pleased to afflict him, and
chose that season in which to manifest his goodness to his soul.

Others of the Lord's family are afflicted with providential

trials. The world have these as well as they; but the providential
trials that the children of men are exercised with never drive
them to God; they often, yea, usually drive them deeper and
deeper into sin; they drive them into debt, to drink, and other
bad courses, to drown their worldly cares, and often bring them
eventually to the gallows and the scaffold. But the providential
trials that the Lord's people have to pass through shew them
what before was hidden from them, that there is a God of
providence. Those who see him only as the God of grace see but
one side of the Lord's face. But the providential circumstances the
Lord's people are called to pass through bring more conspicuously
before their eyes the other side of the Lord's countenance—that
of providence. When they see how God appears for them in their
temporal circumstances, it causes the sweet flowings forth of
faith and love towards their kind Parent; and this endears him to
them more closely.

There are also family afflictions. These, the Lord's people have
to pass through as well as the world. But family afflictions are not
sanctified to the men of this world: they disunite instead of
bringing together: they make the home miserable: but never
bring into their hearts any looking to the Lord to heal the breach.
But the Lord's family who have to pass through family afflictions
often find a profit in them. Idols are dethroned, worldly affections
are restrained: and that peace which they cannot find in the
bosom of their families they are led to seek for in the bosom of
their God.

Thus those temporal afflictions which passing over the men of the
world are as the thunderbolt to strike, are to God's people a
fertilizing shower, causing them to bring forth fruit to his honour;
and thus the same cloud which hangs in vengeance over the men
of this world, and with lightning-flash often hurls them into
perdition, drops down fatness upon the children of God.

But there are other afflictions of a far deeper, far more cutting,
and far more painful nature than any of those temporal afflictions
which the Lord's people may be called upon to pass through—
these are spiritual afflictions. The Lord's people are peculiarly
circumstanced. I have endeavoured to shew that they have
temporal afflictions in common with the rest of mankind; yet they
have them in a peculiar way, as being sanctified to them. But
spiritual afflictions are peculiar to them altogether; and, if we
may give a balance of profit, we must assign a far greater share
to spiritual afflictions than we can to temporal.

The weight of guilt upon the conscience; the distressing

sensations that sin produces when God the Spirit charges it home
upon the soul, is one of the afflictions which God's people are
called to pass through. Indeed, without knowing the affliction of a
guilty conscience for sin and for having transgressed against the
Lord, no man can know the healing balm of the gospel. God's
consolations are reserved for, and abound in proportion to these
spiritual afflictions. So that he that would fain draw his neck out
of the collar of affliction would also draw his neck out of the
fulfillment of God's promises in giving consolation. The feeling of
having sinned against God must lie heavy on every conscience
made tender in God's fear. It is the first mark of life; and not
merely the first mark of life, but it runs through the whole of a
Christian man's experience. Does he daily sin? He is daily so far
as God lays it upon his conscience afflicted in consequence of
sin. And the more that the fear of God works in his soul, and the
more that his conscience is made and kept tender and alive, the
more is he afflicted by the sin which he daily and hourly commits.
All the Lord's people suffer under this affliction: some indeed
more deeply and perpetually than others. But just in proportion
as the Lord would make the soul fruitful in his ways, does he
afflict it with a deeper knowledge of sin, that it may prize the
gospel more, receive pardon more graciously and abundantly,
and bless God for the very stroke that has struck most deeply
into the conscience.

Temptations form another source of spiritual affliction to God's

people. The Lord's family often, in passing through temptations,
think themselves different from all others. They can scarcely
believe that any of the children of God are tempted as they are—
that such vile thoughts, such base desires, such carnal
imaginations, such wicked lusts, should work in the minds of
others, who appear to them to be holy and spiritual. And it is
often a weighty part of the affliction that it is peculiar: for the
Lord's people, especially in their younger days, before they have
learnt how others are similarly exercised, often write bitter things
against themselves in consequence of these temptations.
Temptations to infidelity, to blasphemy, to renounce the cause of
God and truth, to commit the vilest sins painted in the
imagination, to pride, hypocrisy, presumption, and despair: these
various temptations lie heavy on a tender conscience, and cut
deep just in proportion to the depth of godly fear within.

The daily conflict that we have to maintain in our souls against

the world, the flesh, and the devil; the struggle of grace against
nature, and of nature against grace; the sinkings of the one, and
the risings of the other, that are perpetually going on in the souls
of God's people—this ceaseless conflict is an affliction that the
Lord's people are all called on to pass through.

But what profit is there in all these afflictions? Does God send
them without an object in view? Do they come merely, as the
men of the world think, by chance? No. There is profit intended
by them. The apostle unfolds this very clearly in Heb. 12:10,
where he says, our fathers "for a few days chastened us after
their own pleasure: but God for our profit, that we might be
partakers of his holiness." The branch cannot bear fruit except it
be purged: the love of sin cannot be cast out: the soul cannot be
meekened, humbled, softened, and made contrite: the world
cannot be embittered: the things of time and sense cannot be
stripped of their false hue and their magic appearance, except
through affliction. Jesus is a "root out of a dry ground:" there is
"no form nor comeliness in him," except just in proportion as
afflictions exercise our souls, and the Spirit through them draws
us into nearness of union and communion with him. Our greatest
blessings usually spring from our greatest afflictions: they
prepare the heart to receive them; they empty the vessel of the
poisonous ingredients, which have filled it, and fit it to receive
gospel wine and milk. They are made blessings in this respect
also, that they stir up in us a "spirit of grace and of supplication;"
that they draw forth and manifest the fruits and graces of the
Spirit, which God has implanted. They are to us what the plough
and the harrow are to the soil; they cause a preparation of heart
in order to receive the consolations of the gospel. God, therefore,
having chosen Zion in the furnace of affliction, "leaves in the
midst of her an afflicted people." To be then without these
afflictions, these griefs, these trials, these temptations, is to write
ourselves destitute of grace. But our coward flesh shrinks from
them. We are willing to walk to heaven; but not to walk thither in
God's way. Though we see in the scripture, and in the experience
of others, that the path to glory is a rough and rugged way; yet
when our feet are planted in that painful and trying path, we
shrink back; our coward flesh refuses to walk in that road. God
therefore, as a sovereign, brings those afflictions upon us which
he sees most fit for our profit and his glory, without ever
consulting us, without ever allowing us a choice in the matter.
And he will generally cause our afflictions to come from the most
unexpected source. Our afflictions usually come upon us like a
thunder-storm. We are looking into the wind for afflictions: but
God causes them to come from precisely the opposite quarter. A
trial therefore generally comes in a way most cutting to our
feelings: in the way that of all others we should least have
chosen: and yet in a way which of all others is most for our profit.

But how are we to know whether afflictions do profit us? We

sometimes mistake in this matter. We imagine that afflictions are
necessarily connected at the time with manifest blessing. If the
manifestations and consolations of divine love do not come at
the very time with the affliction, we are often disposed to
believe that the affliction has passed over our head without profit.
But we are not so to measure afflictions. Affliction is one thing,
consolation is another. Affliction is to prepare the heart for
consolation; but when and how the consolation shall come, God
has not laid down any rule in his Word. Do the afflictions we pass
through humble us? They do us good. Do they deaden the love of
the world in our hearts? They do us good. Do they purge out
hypocrisy? They do us good. Do they bring us more earnestly to
the throne of grace? They do us good. Do they discover to us sins
that we have not before seen? They do us good. Do they
penetrate into our very hearts? Do they lay bare the corrupt
fountain that we carry within us? Do they search and try us
before a heart-searching God? Do they meeken and soften our
spirit? Are they accompanied with a pouring out of the heart
before God? They do us good. It is necessary that this
preparation work should be done before the consolation comes. It
is like a surgeon dealing with a diseased place. How painful the
operation! How deep the knife cuts! How long it may be before
the wound is healed! Yet every stroke of the knife is
indispensable. He would not do his duty as a skilful and faithful
surgeon if he did not dissect it to the very bottom. As pain before
healing is necessary, and must be produced by the knife; so
spiritually, we must be wounded and cut in our souls, as long,
and as deeply as God sees needful, that in his own time we may
receive the consolation.

2. But there is another word which the text contains as

descriptive of the character of God's people, that is, poor; not
necessarily, not always, poor in temporal circumstances. Not but
that the great majority of God's people are poor; not but that
God has "chosen the poor of this world rich in faith." But we
should give but a literal exposition of the text, did we confine it to
temporal poverty; we must view it higher; we must look at its
spiritual bearing, and interpret it as the Lord himself speaks,
"Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of
heaven."

Now the Lord has declared, he will leave in the midst of

Jerusalem a spiritually poor people. Are they so by nature? O no;
they are not so by nature. They are not brought down into the
depths of soul poverty except by the Almighty himself. They are
by nature rich in their own eyes, as the Laodicean church
esteemed herself. It is the work of grace upon their hearts that
makes them poor; it is the stripping hand of the Spirit of God in
their conscience that reduces them to poverty and ruin before the
throne of mercy. And we become rich spiritually, not by adding to
our natural stock, but by losing it. We become free by going to
gaol. We have our debts paid by becoming bankrupts. We
become partakers of the riches of Christ's grace and compassion
by sinking down into the depths of soul beggary.

But the Lord's people are spiritually poor in two ways. They are
poor actually; and they are poor in spirit. They are poor
actually as to divine attainments. They are poor in faith, so as
not to be able at times to muster a single grain. They are poor in
hope, for often their frail bark is tossed by the waves of
despondency. They are poor in love, for often they cannot feel a
spark of affection towards the Lord or his people. They are poor
in spiritual-mindedness, for they cannot raise up their
affections from earth to heaven. They are poor in prayerfulness,
for often they cannot heave forth a single sigh or cry to God.
They are poor in strength, for they cannot stand against
temptation, and are unable to produce in their souls one gracious
desire, one spiritual feeling. Thus actual poverty makes them
poor in spirit. It is not like the actual poverty of man naturally,
which is carefully disguised and cloaked over; but those who are
poor actually are poor in spirit before God. They feel it, and are
often exercised about it, and distressed in their souls because
they are so poor. They would be rich, but cannot produce in their
hearts any true riches. And this conviction of their own poverty
makes them poor in spirit before God. They cannot come to him
"rich, and increased in goods;" their cry is rather, "My leanness,
my leanness; woe unto me!"

III.—This leads me to the last mark which God the Spirit has
stamped upon the Lord's people—that "they trust in the name
of the Lord." Is there no connection between these two points?
Is there no spiritual bond between their affliction and poverty,
and their trusting in the name of the Lord? Yes: the closest. They
would not trust in the name of the Lord, if they were not afflicted
and poor. The Lord himself brings them to trust in his name—that
is the object of his dealings with them. But they cannot be
brought to trust in his name except by being afflicted and poor. I
will shew you how. Until they are afflicted in their bodies,
circumstances, or families, they are hanging upon the world.
They are seeking to gather a crop of happiness from nature's
polluted soil: they are trying to re-enter into that earthly paradise
from which their first parents were driven: they hope to die in
their nests, and multiply their days as the sand. And this leads
them from the Lord. They cannot trust in his name as long as
they are seeking comfort outside of him.

So also with respect to their spiritual afflictions. There is no

trusting in the name of the Lord until sorrow and affliction have
done their work in the heart. We are looking to our own
righteousness, strength, wisdom, and holiness. Whilst these
remain unbroken, there can be no inward, heart-felt faith; no
simple reliance, no implicit confidence. These afflictions, and this
poverty, then, by purging out of our hearts false faith, empty
confidence, and delusive expectations, bring us, in the hand of
the Spirit, to trust only in the name of the Lord.

But what is meant by the expression, in the text, "the name of

the Lord?" By "the name of the Lord," we are to understand the
Lord's revealed perfections; whatever he has declared concerning
himself. But more especially are we to understand by "the name
of the Lord," the only-begotten Son of God; as he said to Moses,
"Behold, I send an Angel before thee, to keep thee in the way,
and to bring thee into the place which I have prepared. Beware of
him, and obey his voice, provoke him not; for he will not pardon
your transgressions; for my Name is in him" (Ex. 23:20, 21);
that is, my essential attributes; all that "I Am," the great "I Am,"
is all in him. So that, to "trust in the name of the Lord" is to trust
in what Jesus is and what Jesus has for the benefit of his people.

"The name of the Lord," then, comprehends all that God has
revealed concerning himself: and all that dwells in Jesus Christ. It
therefore comprehends the glorious Person of Christ, the Object
and Centre to which all God's people turn: Immanuel, the
Mediator between God and man: the great High Priest over the
house of God: the Saviour of the lost, the Hope of the hopeless,
and the Help of the helpless.
Now, our afflictions when sanctified, and our poverty when felt,
prepare the heart to trust in Jesus. Why? Should we trust in him,
if we could trust in ourselves? Should we hope in him, if we could
hope in ourselves? Should we hang upon him, if we could hang
upon the creature? But we do trust in ourselves, we do hope in
ourselves, and we do hang upon the creature, till we are cut off.
The Lord finds us hanging upon self, the world, the creature—
glued and riveted to them all. He therefore cuts asunder this
natural union, and brings us out of it, that we may have a felt
union with the Lord of life and glory. He takes us out of the old
olive tree, and grafts us into the good olive, to receive of its root
and fatness. But can this be done without being cut off, and thus
having our natural union broken asunder? We remain upon the
old stock; we still grow upon the old tree; we bear nothing but
the rank berries of the wild olive tree, till the sharp grafting knife
comes to cut the soul from the old stock, and graft it into the
Lord of life and glory. These afflictions therefore are needful, that
by them we may be cut off the old stock, and grafted into the
new olive tree. You complain that your afflictions are so deep,
your trials so cutting, your temptations so severe! They must be
cutting, deep, and severe. Till they have broken in twain the old
union—till the scion is fairly cut off, there is no grafting into the
new stock. Therefore they must be deep; for is not the natural
union deep? They must be sharp: for is not the natural union
close? They must be cutting, and felt to be cutting; for when the
scion is cut from the old olive tree, does it not bleed at every
pore? There cannot be separation without cutting. Will the skilful
gardener, when he takes out his knife to graft the scion, make
but a slight incision in the bark? That is but playing; that is what
a child might do with his penny knife. There is a work to be
executed, a result to be brought about: sap is to flow into the
scion. And that cannot be effected without separation and
grafting into the new stock. Therefore, by these afflictions and
exercises the old union is cut through. And when the old union is
cut through, the blessed Spirit grafts us into a living union with
the Lord of life and glory.
We are brought to trust in his Person. And O, what sweet views
does the Lord sometimes indulge the soul with of the glorious
Person of Immanuel! What sympathy, compassion, and
tenderness does the soul see in him, "who is over all, God
blessed for ever," the great High Priest over the house of God!
What beauty and glory did my soul see in him when I lay on a
sick bed since I saw you face to face! Thus, when the beauty of
Immanuel is seen by the eye of faith, a measure of his grace
experienced in the heart, and he becomes the centre of all our
hopes and wishes, how do the affections, feelings, and panting
desires of the soul flow to, and centre in him!

They are brought also, in trusting in the name of the Lord, to

trust in his blood, that blood which "cleanseth from all sin"—the
blood of "Immanuel, God with us"—that holy, that healing blood,
which sprinkled on the conscience makes it whiter than snow. O
the virtue, the validity, the efficacy of Christ's atoning blood upon
a poor sinner's conscience! This atoning blood is a part of "the
name of the Lord;" and the poor and needy—the tempted, tried,
afflicted, exercised, and distressed children of God—are brought
by their sorrow, affliction, and trials, in the hands of the Spirit, to
trust in this atoning blood as cleansing them from all sin.

And what a beauty and glory do they see also in his justifying
righteousness, What a comely robe, what a refuge, what a
harbour, what a shelter to the soul exposed to the thunderbolts of
divine vengeance! They are brought to trust in this
righteousness; and by trusting in it, to "trust in the name of the
Lord."

They are brought to trust also in all the perfections of God, as

revealed in the face of Jesus Christ—to trust to his unfailing
faithfulness to his sovereign purpose; to the stability of the
eternal covenant; to the promises spoken by his mouth; and to
the words that dropped from his expiring lips, "It is finished!" In
trusting to these heavenly certainties, these immovable
foundations, they "trust in the name of the Lord."
And in trusting to the sympathy, tenderness, condescension,
lovingkindness, in a word, to the heart of Immanuel, they are
trusting also "in the name of the Lord." Thus they trust in the
compassion and sympathy that dwell in the bosom, and gush in
overflowing streams from the heart of the Lord of life and glory.

But who needs this tender pity and sympathy? The destitute, the
afflicted, the exercised, and the disconsolate. Is it not so
naturally? The healthy, the mirthful, the gay, the lively—do they
want sympathy, tenderness, affection, bowels of pity? They want
them not. But the distressed, the afflicted, the sorrowful, the
mourning, and the desponding—these need sympathy. Is it not so
spiritually? What can our souls know of the sympathy, the
compassion, and the tenderness that flow forth from the broken
heart of Immanuel, unless we are in circumstances to need his
sympathy, his pity, his love? Our afflictions, therefore, and
exercises bring us into the situation to draw them forth: as the
infant draws forth the milk from its mother's breast, so to draw
forth into our hearts the sympathy and tenderness of Immanuel.
In trusting to this sympathy, and in hanging upon this
tenderness, we "trust in the name of the Lord."

And everything that the soul sees in Jesus, every grace, beauty,
and loveliness that the eyes of the understanding behold in him,
when the heart is touched by the Spirit—to trust in all these, is to
"trust in the name of the Lord." In a word, all that Jesus is, and
all that Jesus has; the whole of his divine nature, the whole of his
human nature, the whole of his complex nature as God-Man—all
that Immanuel was in eternity, and all that Immanuel will be to
all eternity—all his glorious fullness able to satisfy the wants of all
his church as her risen and glorified Head—all is comprehended in
one word, "the name of the Lord." This is the strong tower, into
which the righteous run, and are safe.

But how do we trust in him? We cannot trust in him till we know

him. Do I trust a man whom I do not know? It would not do in
this metropolis. I must know a man to trust him. So spiritually.
We must know that the Lord deserves our trust before we can put
our trust in him. We must have proved his faithfulness before we
can fully rest upon him. In a word, "trust" implies this—though
we cannot see the object of our trust, yet we rely on him from
the knowledge we have of his faithfulness. It is like the wife, who
has implicit confidence in her husband: he is away from her: but
her confidence in his faithfulness fails not. It is the confidence of
a child in his parent, which ceases not, though the child be at
school, and separated by many miles. It is the trust of friends
when divided by distance. Trust does not require sight: it relies
upon the Object trusted in from what we know of him, though
present sight and present experience be denied. It is so
spiritually. It is a poor trust that requires sight. "We walk by faith,
not by sight." The nature of faith is to trust in the dark, when all
appearances are against it: to trust that a calm will come, though
the storm be overhead: to trust that God will appear, though
nothing but evil be felt. It is tender, child-like, and therefore is an
implicit confidence, a yielding submission, a looking unto the
Lord. There is something filial in this: something heavenly and
spiritual; not the bold presumption of the daring, nor the
despairing fears of the desponding: but something beyond both
the one and the other—equally remote from the rashness of
presumption, and from the horror of despair. There is a mingling
of holy affection connected with this trust, springing out of a
reception of past favours, insuring favours to come: and all linked
with a simple hanging and depending of the soul upon the Lord,
because he is what he is. There is a looking to, and relying upon
the Lord, because we have felt him to be the Lord; and because
we have no other refuge.

And why have we no other refuge? Because poverty has driven us

out of false refuges. It is a safe spot, though not a comfortable
one, to be where David was, "Refuge failed me; no man cared for
my soul" (Ps. 142:4). And until refuge fails us in man, in self, in
the world, in the church, there is no looking to Christ as a divine
refuge. But when we come to this spot, "Thou art my refuge and
my portion in the land of the living" (Ps. 142:5)—'If I perish, I will
perish at thy feet—my faith centres in thee—all I have, and all I
expect to have, flows from thy bounty—I have nothing but what
thou freely givest to me, the vilest of the vile'—this is trust. And
where this trust is, there will be a whole army of desires at times
pouring themselves into the bosom of the Lord: there will be a
whole array of pantings and longings venting themselves into the
bosom of "Immanuel, God with us."

But this trust must be tried. It is so naturally. We cannot trust

persons till we have tried them. And if we have tried them, and
proved them unfaithful, we will not trust them. What is our
nature to be trusted in? Man. a poor dying worm is not to be
trusted in for anything: and God makes us to feel that none are
to be trusted but himself. Thus, by afflictions and by poverty of
spirit communicated by them, he leads us to trust only in his
name. And this trust will never be put to confusion. This
expectation will never be cut off. We may have to walk in
darkness, much darkness: yet there will be a secret looking unto,
and enquiring of the Lord in the midst of the darkness, that will
not be disappointed. "He that believeth shall not make haste."

In this congregation there are, doubtless, those who know what it

is to be afflicted—doubtless, those who know what it is to be poor
in spirit. Now, my friends, just look at the tendency of these
afflictions; at the fruit, which springs out of them. Do look at this
point—What have they done for you? That is the point my eye is
fixed upon as regard myself. What do afflictions do for me? What
is the fruit produced by them? Have they brought you—have they
brought me—to this one thing—to trust in the Lord—to come
more simply, more singly unto him who is "able also to save to
the uttermost?" Have they drawn forth a larger degree of
submission to his will—a greater measure of reliance and
confidence in him—a more frequent and closer communion with
him—a more simple hiding ourselves in him, as having none
other to hide ourselves in? Now, if our afflictions and trials have
not produced this, I am sure it will often bring us to a stand to
know what good they have done us. It is a thing, which has often
tried my soul. The afflictions of body and mind, which I have had
to pass through often seem to leave me just as they found me. I
can bear afflictions when they do me good: nay, in my right
mind, I would rather have afflictions and temptations, however
sharp and cutting, if they do my soul good, than be at ease in
Zion, and settled on my lees. But this often tries my mind—they
seem to do my soul so little good. Yet this I have felt them to do
they make me to trust more in the name of the Lord. There is a
weaning effect produced by them; a more earnest searching of
heart: a more simple looking to him who alone can guide and
keep. There is a cutting of the thread of the world: and
embittering of the things of time and sense: more fervent desires
after God's favour and presence: and tenderer confidence raised
up in the name of the Lord as all my heart's desire.

These are some of the marks and evidences of the children of

God. Have, then, your afflictions, trials, and exercises brought
you to feel more earnestness of heart; given you more simplicity
of purpose in the depths of that conscience into which none but
the eye of God can look; led you to see more in Jesus than ever
you saw before; to cleave more with your heart to that which
before you viewed only in your judgment? Then they have done
your soul good; they have stamped upon you this mark,
whatever men may say or think, which God has put upon his own
sheep, and by which they will be known in the day when he
maketh up his jewels—"I will leave in the midst of thee an
afflicted and poor people, and they shall trust in the name of the
Lord."
Alienation and Reconciliation

Preached at North Street Chapel, Stamford, on Lord's Day

Morning, Feb. 16, 1862

"And you, that were sometime alienated, and enemies in your

mind by wicked works, yet now hath he reconciled, in the body of
his flesh through death, to present you holy, and unblameable,
and unreproveable in his sight; if ye continue in the faith
grounded and settled, and be not moved away from the hope of
the gospel, which ye have heard." Col. 1:21-23

To some, if not many professors of religion, the constant

preaching of the same doctrines, the continual opening up of the
same experience, and the perpetual enforcing of the same
practice become, after a certain period, irksome and wearisome.
"O, for a little change, a little novelty, a little variety," is their
secret cry, if not their expressed complaint. Let us look, then, at
this complaint fully and fairly in the face. Let us see if it have any
well-grounded foundation, for if it have we are bound to listen to
it, and if possible remove it. What, then, do you mean by
"variety?" Do you mean a variety in truth, or a variety of truth?
for these two things widely differ. Let me explain how. Look at
the Scriptures, for instance, which, as being inspired by the Holy
Ghost, are all pure truth, and in which therefore there can be no
intermixture whatever of error. But what a pleasing, charming,
and profitable variety is there in the way in which the Holy Ghost
has been pleased to set forth truth in the sacred volume!
Compare, for instance, the simple, plain, historical language of
Genesis, with the poetical, figurative, imaginative style of the
Song of Solomon. Compare again the close, pointed, pithy,
sentenious wisdom of the Proverbs with the sublime, rapturous,
and flowing language of Isaiah; or the calm, sober, quiet
instruction of Ecclesiastes with the mourning, sighing, lamenting
supplications, or warm, glowing praises in the Book of Psalms.
There is, then, not only a very great, but a very pleasing and
profitable variety in the pages of the Old Testament, when we
take the wide range which extends itself between Genesis and
Malachi. Or look at the New Testament. Compare the Gospel of
Matthew with that of John, or the revelation of the inspired
disciple in the lonely isle of Patmos with the Epistles of Paul to the
saints at Ephesus and Colosse. How these holy books differ in
language and expression, yet all proclaim the same truth! Well,
that variety which I call a variety in truth has the sanction of
God; and, as holding it up in different points of view, presents it
to us more fully and clearly, and so more profitably than a
constant repetition of the same words. Now apply this to the
complaint which I am examining. If a minister has to preach to a
people continually as their settled pastor, it is highly desirable
that there should be a variety in his mode of handling the truth;
that he should not be ever using the same language, nor be ever
treading the same beaten ground; but should bring forward from
time to time the same precious truth,—for the truth of God, like
the Church to whom it is given, is but "one" (Song 6:9),—and yet
not always in the same way. For as the Lord the Spirit enlarges
his heart he will also open his mouth, and enable him, as a
"scribe well instructed unto the kingdom of heaven, to be like
unto a man that is a house holder, which bringeth forth out of his
treasure things new and old." This variety, then, I do not object
to, nay, wish that I were blessed with more of it; for how ample
is the field of truth if we can but walk at large in it! The longest
life would be too short, and the most enlarged ministry too
narrow, to exhaust a thousandth part of the treasures contained
in this field; for the more it is cultivated the more bounteous a
crop it yields, the more deeply it is dug into the richer the mine is
found to be. But there is a variety of truth, which, in fact, is only
another word for the introduction into it of error. No such variety
as that is admissible into a pulpit which is dedicated to the pure
truth of God. But as an illustration to show you the difference
between a variety in truth and a variety of truth, take a simple
figure. There may be a variety, and not only a desirable, but
almost necessary variety in our daily food; but whatever variety
there may be introduced into it, it must all be sound and
nourishing; for who could eat it, or desire to eat it, if it were
unsound, diseased, or not nutritious? How should you like, for
instance, to have a loaf of bread for breakfast and one made of
sawdust for tea; a slice of meat at dinner and of carrion at
supper; a glass of water from a pure spring at one meal and one
from the town ditch at another? Just so it would be if, for the
sake of variety, I should occasionally change my doctrine, or
introduce a little novelty into my experience, or alter the drift of
my perceptive exhortations. I might in this way, if conscience
would allow me or you would sit to hear it, give you a great deal
of variety. I might preach, for instance, free will in the morning,
and free grace in the afternoon; tell you one Sunday that you can
only be saved by Christ's righteousness, and on another by your
own; assure you one week evening that the path to heaven is
very straight and narrow, and hard to be found, and on another
that any one may find it who likes, and that it is open all day long
for all comers as much as Regent-street or the Strand. I might
inculcate one day a life separate from the world, and close
walking with God; and on another tell you there was no harm in
partaking a little of the pleasures and amusements of life, so long
as you said your prayers regularly and read the Bible
occasionally. Do you want this variety, this trimming between
truth and error, this serving God and mammon, this half for
Christ and half for the world, this motley mixture whereby so
many seek to serve two masters and please all people? Would
you like some indulgence to be given to your lusts? That variety I
hope never to give. Of one thing I am very sure, that I should not
be fit to stand up here if I were to act so treacherous a part to
God and my own conscience. Let me present truth before you,
according as the Lord may give me gifts, in all gracious and
spiritual variety, so as to profit your soul; but the Lord keep me
from indulging that cry for variety from carnal hearts which
makes truth and error to be one. Would you like it in natural
things, that I should speak truth on Sunday and tell lies on
Monday? be honest on Tuesday and cheat on Wednesday? Would
you wish to act so yourself? Then it cannot be so in the things of
God. Is honesty only for the shop and the market-place? Truth
must always be truth and error must always be error in the things
of God as well as of man. We must keep the two distinct, as we
should keep laudanum out of our drink and arsenic out of our
food; unless to poison the soul is less criminal or dangerous than
to poison the body.

I just drop these observations as introductory to our text, which

is the old beaten road, still proclaiming that truth which, however
old, must be in the hands of the Spirit ever new—man's ruin and
alienation from God, and the only way of recovery from it by
sovereign grace. The very text, therefore, may seem to some to
be still treading the same ground, beating the same bush. In a
sense it is so; for if Jesus be "the same yesterday, to-day, and for
ever," his truth will be same also. But if the Lord is pleased to
open my mouth this morning by his own blessed Spirit to unfold
experimentally, the gracious truths which he has lodged in the
words before us, you will find even this old path become new. As
Bunyan well says, "All things become new when there is the smell
of heaven upon them;" and, as Bunyan's Lord and Master said
before him, "Behold, I make all things new" (Rev. 21:5); so with
his help and blessing, we may find something new in them
without being novel, something suitable and savoury in their
contents without being stale.

In opening our text, therefore, I shall view it under four different

aspects, and shall briefly characterise each by one word, to
impress it more thoroughly upon your memory:—

I.—First, Alienation: "And you that were sometime alienated, and

enemies in your mind by wicked works."

II—Secondly, Reconciliation: "Yet now hath he reconciled, in the

body of his flesh through death."

III.—Thirdly, Presentation: "To present you holy and

unblameable, and unreprovoable in his sight."

IV.—Lastly, Continuation: "If ye continue in the faith grounded

and settled, and be not moved away from the hope of the gospel,
which ye have heard."

1.—First, then, let us consider that painful subject, and yet one
which all who are taught of God must learn in their own bosom—
Alienation. "And you, that were some time alienation."

i. Let us seek to dive into the meaning of this term, as used by

the apostle to describe our state and condition before God by
nature and practice. What do we understand literally by it?
Strangership. It is only another word to convey much the same
idea, though in a more forcible manner, of one who is a foreigner
or a stranger in a land to which he has no claim by birth or
inheritance. And you will observe there is a distinction between
being an alien and being "alienated." Let me show you the
difference. Every foreigner in this country is an "alien," unless
naturalised, that is, made an English citizen, by renouncing his
allegiance to his own sovereign and becoming subject to ours.
But if an Englishman, a native of this country, were to go to
America and cast off his allegiance to our sovereign by becoming
a citizen of the United States, he would be "alienated," that is,
from his former country and his former sovereign; and, as has
actually occurred in many cases, his love might turn to enmity,
and he might actually fight against the country which gave him
birth. In this sense, man by nature is not only an alien but
alienated.

For was man thus ever an alien and an enemy to God? Was there
always a breach, a distance, a separation between God and him?
Not so. Did not the Lord make man in his own image, after his
own likeness? When he had created him, did he not place him in
a garden of all manner of delight and pleasure, as the word Eden
means? Did he not look down from heaven upon him and
pronounce all his works good, and man as the last of them very
good? for it was not until the close of the sixth day, when man
stood before the Lord, created in his own image, that "he saw
everything that he had made and behold it was very good; for the
last creation put the stamp of God's approbation upon the whole.
And when thus created did not the Lord have sweet communion
with him in the garden where he had placed him; for we read of
his "walking in the garden in the cool of the day" (Gen. 3:8), as if
he came daily in the cool of eve to converse face to face with the
intelligent creature of his hand? There was no breach then, no
enmity, no alienation. God and man were friends, and, if I may
use the expression, the best of friends, for the One was blessed
in giving and the other in receiving. But, alas! this blessed state
did not continue long. How long we know not, but evidently for
but a short period. An enemy came stealing into this happy
garden, a tempter once an angel of light, but now a fiend, full of
all subtlety and malice, whom God permitted in his inscrutable
wisdom to carry out his hellish plot and execute his infernal
design. Satan, under the guise of a serpent, was permitted to
tempt the woman; she was allowed to tempt the man, and he
not, as she, overcome and overborne by temptation, but wilfully
disobeyed the command of God, and thus, with his eyes open,
precipitated himself and all his future race into the deepest abyss
of sin and misery; for we all fell in him. This may seem at first
sight strange, and some have called it unjust; but we were in him
as our federal head, in his loins, as Levi was in the loins of
Abraham (Heb. 7:10); and thus what he did we virtually did in
him. The Scripture is clear here: "By one man sin entered into the
world and death by sin; and so death passed upon all men, for
that [I prefer the marginal reading, "in whom"] all have sinned."
So again, "By one man's offence [margin, "by one offence"] death
hath reigned by one;" find again, "By one man's disobedience
many were made sinners." (Rom. 5:12, 17, 19.) I like to make
my points clear, and this is the reason why I thus, from the
Scriptures, trace up sin to its fountain head. But now what was
the consequence of this original sin, this act of rebellion and
disobedience of our first parent? Alienation from God. A breach
was made, estrangement introduced. Those who were once
friends now became separated, and, what was far worse, they
became enemies. So wide, so deep was this chasm then made,
that, like the fixed gulf of which Abraham speaks in the parable,
none could pass over it, nor could it ever have been brought
together but for God's eternal purpose of love and mercy in the
Person and work of his dear Son.

But you may say, "How is it that this descended to me? If Adam
sinned and fell, I was not in Paradise, how could I help his sinning
against God? I was not there to hold back his hand from taking
the forbidden fruit. Why then should I, an innocent man, suffer
for his transgression? If a man now commit theft or murder, the
law does not punish the innocent with the guilty." Then, I
suppose, you have no personal sins of our own, and can stand
before God perfectly holy and innocent? "No," you say, "I don't
mean that, for I know that I am a sinner." But how did you
become a sinner? Don't you see how in the fall the seed of sin
was deposited by Satan in the very nature of Adam; that this
alienation was dropped, as it were, from Satan's hand into his
heart, as an acorn may fall into the earth, where it struck root
and grew, and so filled, so to speak, the whole of his nature that
it thrust out, like an overgrown tree, everything that was good.
But you may say, "How could one sin do this?" Cannot a grain of
poison, say strychnine, diffuse itself through a whole vessel full of
water? So sin spread itself through the whole of Adam's body and
soul, killing the life of God therein and corrupting his nature
throughout. But still the question arises, "How can this reach us?"
Why, as like can only beget like, the alienation that Satan sowed
in the heart of man in the fall in infecting him infected the whole
of the race that should spring from him. Do we not read that
"Adam begat a son in his own likeness, after his image?" (Gen.
5:3.) A fallen son must come from a fallen sire. Thus we come
into the world alienated from the image of God, and this
alienation is our birthright, our portion, our miserable inheritance;
all that we can really call our own for time or for eternity.

1. But look at the consequences of being thus alienated from the

image of God. He who is the fountain of all bliss could not, even if
he would, make a creature unlike and estranged from himself
really and truly happy; for alienation springs out of sin, and sin is
abhorred by the holiness, and amenable to the justice of God.
And see how this state of alienation from God goes on, until at
last it ends in thorough ruin. We come into the world alienated
from his image, for we lost it in the fall; we grow up still more
and more alienated from it, and if we die thus alienated, what
must that end be but eternal destruction from the presence of his
glory? for there is no reconciliation or regeneration in the grave.
There is no possibility of coming into a state of friendship with
God when the breath has left the body. As the tree falls, so it lies.
If we die aliens, we die under the wrath of God.

2. But look a little further into the meaning of the word now
before us. In being alienated from God, we are alienated from the
knowledge of God. Our blessed Lord, in his intercessory prayer,
says, "This is life eternal, that they might know thee the only true
God, and Jesus Christ whom thou hast sent." This alienation,
therefore, is an alienation from the knowledge of God; for its
leading, its prominent feature is death in sin. So the apostle
speaks of the Gentiles "being alienated from the life of God
through the ignorance that is in them, because of the blindness of
their heart." (Eph. 4:18.) If, then, the knowledge of God be
eternal life, ignorance of God must be eternal death. He says in
his word, "Acquaint thyself with God and be at peace;" but we
have no acquaintance with him by nature, and therefore no
peace, for "there is no peace to the wicked." There is a veil of
ignorance and unbelief spread over our heart (2 Cor. 3:15); and
besides this, Satan, the god of this world, blinds our mind and
hardens our conscience, so that we neither see the light nor want
to see it, for we have an inward consciousness that our deeds are
evil. We may indeed by the natural light of conscience and by a
traditionary religion know God in some small measure as a just
and holy Lord, whose displeasure we fear; but we cannot know
him as a God of mercy, goodness, and truth, for as such he has
not been revealed to our soul, nor have we thus beheld his glory
in the face of Jesus Christ.

3. But consider a little more closely the force of the word

"alienated." There is an alienation, as the apostle speaks, in a
passage which I have already quoted, from the life of God. When
the Lord begins a work of grace upon our heart, he makes us
partakers of a new, a spiritual, and eternal life. This life is in
Jesus as a covenant head, for he is the head of his body, the
Church; and at regeneration it is communicated out of his fulness
to the various members of his mystical body, whereby, as made
partakers of his grace, they then for the first time live unto him,
live upon him, and live by him. This life, as being a divine gift and
work, the apostle calls "the life of God," not meaning thereby the
eternal, essential life of God which he ever lives in himself as the
self-existent Jehovah, but the life of grace communicated by him
and from him to his people. Now in our state of nature, we are
alienated from this life of God; that is, we are strangers to a life
of faith in the Son of God. The life which we had in Adam we have
lost, being, as the Scripture declares, dead in trespasses and
sins, and thus are unable to quicken our own souls. Nay, we are
not only strangers to it, but alienated from it, as hating it and
despising it when seen in others, being dimly conscious that there
is such a thing, but filled with bitter enmity to, and proud
contempt of it.

4. But look still a little further at the word "alienated." There is an

alienation from the will of God, that is, his revealed will, for his
secret will we know not. This will he has revealed in the
Scriptures of truth, and ever and anon there flash forth rays of
holiness from this revealed will which strike upon, though they do
not enter into or influence the unregenerated heart. But in this
light, sufficient to condemn if not sufficient to convince, we often
see and feel the will of God to be opposed to our own. Yet,
though we see the alienation of our heart from this will, we are
determined to have our own way, cost us what it may. This, in
fact, is rebellion of the deepest dye. There is, therefore, no
submission to God's will in affliction; no desire to know it or to do
it, however often the lips may vainly utter, "Thy will be done in
earth as it is in heaven."

ii. But there is something worse behind; there is even a state

worse than alienation. To live and die a stranger to God and
godliness must ensure our destruction, for what mansion in
heaven can we think is prepared for one who is alienated from
the image, knowledge, life, and will of God? But there is even a
more fearful, a more fatal condition than this. When Satan
dropped the seed of sin into the human mind to take root there,
he dropped a more poisonous ingredient wrapped up in it than
alienation, and one which struck deeper root—enmity. That one
word seems to measure the height of man's rebellion and the
depth of man's fall; that he is, as our text declares, an enemy to
God by wicked works. All man's sins, speaking comparatively, are
but motes in the sun-beam compared with this giant sin of
enmity against God. A man may be given up to fleshly
indulgences; he may sin against his fellow creature; may rob,
plunder, oppress, even kill his brother man; but though such sins
are justly condemned by the laws of God and man, yet, viewed in
a spiritual light, what are they compared with the dreadful, the
damnable sin of enmity against the great and glorious Majesty of
heaven? This is a sin that lives beyond the grave. Many sins,
though not their consequences, die with man's body, because
they are bodily sins. But this is a sin that goes into eternity with
him, and flares up like a mighty volcano from the very depths of
the bottomless pit. Yea, it is the very sin of devils, which
therefore binds guilty man down with them in the same eternal
chains, and consigns him to the same place of torment. The very
thought is appalling, because known and felt by the guilty
conscience to be true. O the unutterable enmity of the heart
against the living God! What! that I, that you, in our state of
nature should be enemies to God; that our carnal mind, which is,
in fact, ourselves, for it is the whole of that fleshly image of Adam
with which we were born, should not only be the enemy of God,
but enmity itself, which is far worse, more deep, desperate, and
incurable, because an enemy may be reconciled, but enmity
never! How utterly ruined, then, how wholly lost must that man's
state and case be who lives and dies as he comes into the world
unchanged, unrenewed, unregenerated! If he were only a
stranger to God, an alien from his image, knowledge, life, and
will, he could not, it is true, rise up at death into the presence of
God in heaven; for what could he or would he do there? God and
he would be as much and indeed more strangers there than on
earth, because then brought more immediately face to face.
Heaven is happiness and holiness. But for whom? For those who
can enjoy it. What happiness could there be, then, in heaven for
one who is a perfect stranger to that holiness without which no
man shall see the Lord? But, still less, how can enmity be
admitted into the realms of eternal peace and love? Will God have
enemies in the courts of bliss? Can his enemies sing the songs of
praise in sweet unison with his friends? When pride entered
heaven in the person of Satan, he and it were cast out together.
How then can enmity enter therein? Could it gain admission, it
would turn heaven itself into hell.

iii. But to proceed a little further into the bosom of our text and
into the opening up from it of this deep and dark mystery of
enmity against God. Observe where this enmity is and how it
works. It is "in the mind." That is the worst part of it. If it were
merely in the understanding, or if its seat were only in the body,
it might haply be weeded out. You can take your hoe and spud
out a weed in your garden, or even a stout thistle in your close;
but what can your hoe do with an oak that has struck its roots
deep into the soil? If a finger be diseased, it may be cut off; but
what are you to do with a gangrene of a vital organ, a diseased
heart, or an ulcerous lung? So, if this enmity were a disease just
in some corner of the mind, it might possibly be got out. But
when the whole mind is full of it, so that it is its very breath and
blood, what can be done then to it? for the very power that
should fight against it is itself infected; and it would be like a
person in the last stage of consumption trying to cure one as far
gone as himself. We come, then, to this conclusion, that nothing
but the mighty power of God himself can ever turn this enemy
into a friend. Nay, even the power of God himself is unable to
destroy the enmity of the carnal mind, for we are assured by his
own testimony that "it is not subject to the law of God, neither
indeed can be." (Rom. 8:7.) It must die with our bodies, if indeed
we are to rise on the resurrection morn, to see the Son of God as
he is, and be conformed to his glorious image. Yes, let it lie and
rot and for ever perish in that grave in which our bones shall turn
to dust, when the worm has fed sweetly upon them.

iv. But look also at another expression of our text, "by wicked
works." We gather from these words the working and the
manifestation of this enmity against God. It is not a dead thing in
the heart, a mere quiet, passive feeling, which lies as still as a
stone; but it manifests itself in "wicked works," in carrying out
the purposes and intents of the carnal mind into downright and
positive action. This you know is the height of rebellion. Thoughts
and words, plots and schemes, may be rebellious, but actions are
rebellion; and who that sees the wicked works daily perpetrated
by the hands of man, or even remembers what he himself did in
the days of his flesh, will not own that in this way the carnal mind
most manifests its bitter enmity? If we loved God by nature we
should do his will and keep his word. But as we despise his will
and disobey his word, it is a plain proof that we neither love nor
fear him, but really hate him.

But I will not dwell longer upon this gloomy subject, on this sad
exhibition of human wickedness and misery, though it is needful
we should know it for ourselves, that we should have a taste of
this bitter cup in our own most painful experience, that we may
know the sweetness of the cup of salvation when presented to
our lips by free and sovereign grace.

II.—Our next point then is Reconciliation. How sweet the sound

as it drops upon the listening ear of the awakened sinner, and is
carried by the power of God into a believing heart! The first work
of grace upon the soul is to convince us of our sins; and as the
Lord the Spirit is pleased to convince us of sin, he opens up by
degrees the secret chambers of imagery and shows us what
strangers we are by nature to God and godliness, what enemies
by wicked works, laying the guilt of this alienation and enmity
upon the conscience. But, together with this work of conviction in
the application of the law to the conscience, there is kindled by
the same divine power a secret yearning after God, a longing for
mercy from him and reconciliation to him. It is a great mistake to
think that in the first dealings of God with the soul nothing is felt
but conviction of guilt. It may seem so to the convinced sinner,
for his mind is too dark to read plainly the writing of God upon his
conscience; but it is not all doubt, fear, and bondage. In most
cases, for I do not deny that there may be exceptions, the Lord is
pleased from time to time to soften and melt the heart, to excite
yearnings after reconciliation, longings to be brought out of that
state of carnality and death in which the law finds us. The Spirit
of God produces this yearning after pardon and peace by being
poured out upon the soul as a Spirit of grace and of supplications.
"They shall come with weeping, and with supplications will I lead
them." (Jer. 31:9.) So it was with the publican in the temple, with
the prodigal in the parable, with the thief upon the cross.
Conviction of sin and prayer for mercy in their cases went hand in
hand. Reconciliation, then, becomes a very sweet sound to a
heart that can, as thus taught and led of God, lay hold of any way
or plan whereby it may come into a state of friendship with God.
The mind may be very dark, unbelief may much prevail, the
conscience be full of guilt, great doubt and fear may possess the
soul, causing the whole inward work of the Spirit to be enveloped
in thick obscurity. Yet through all this thick darkness rays of
divine light will, from time to time, beam upon the mind, either
under the preaching of the Gospel, or in reading the Scriptures,
or by some gentle movements of the Spirit upon the heart in
secret prayer. But all these internal sensations are "cords of love
and bands of a man" whereby the Lord is drawing the soul into
friendship with himself; for his own words are, "I have loved thee
with an everlasting love; therefore with lovingkindness have I
drawn thee." (Jer. 31:3.) This leads us to consider more at length
what reconciliation is as revealed in the word of truth and in a
believing heart.

i. Reconciliation was, in its first rise and origin, a free, voluntary,

spontaneous act upon the part of God. He never consulted the
mind of man or angel upon the matter, or left it in the slightest
degree to hang or hinge upon the will of either. He devised no
plan in which he permitted the creature to share the wisdom of
the contrivance with himself. It was planned in eternity by
himself and by himself alone in his Trinity of Persons yet Unity of
Essence; and when so planned was ordered in the everlasting
covenant, which, as specially fixed between the Father and the
Son, is called in Scripture "the counsel of peace between them
both." (Zech. 6:13.) In heaven the plan was laid, there the
eternal decree fixed, there the mode of its execution unalterably
determined. And O, what a plan it was! It was nothing less than
that God's dear and only-begotten Son should come into this
world, take our nature into union with his own divine Person and
Godhead, and in that nature, which by this intimate union
personally became his own, to suffer, bleed, and die in our room
and stead. But you may say, "What need was there for all this?
Could not God have forgiven man without this sacrifice? Was it
needful his own Son should die that man might be saved?" What
did our Lord say to his Father in the garden? "O my Father, if it
be possible, let this cup pass from me: nevertheless, not as I will,
but as thou wilt." It was the will of God that his Son should take
the cup of sorrow and of deaths and drink it to the very dregs. Do
you think that the prayer of Christ in his agony would not have
moved the Father to contrive some other way, if any other way
had been possible? No; there was, there could be, no other way,
for, as Hart truly speaks,

"Sin to pardon without blood,

Never in His nature stood."

As far, then, as we are enlightened from the Scriptures of truth to

see into the mind of God, there was no possibility of man being
saved without a full and adequate ransom price being paid,
without the law being perfectly obeyed, without atoning blood
being shed, and a perfect satisfaction rendered. But all this could
only be done by the Son of God being made flesh and suffering
for our sake. We must be content with believing this, for our
reason cannot penetrate into this heavenly mystery; and, when
we are led into it by the teaching and testimony of the Blessed
Spirit, we shall not only be content with believing it, but
thankfully receive what God so freely gives.

ii. Looking, however, a little more closely into this heavenly truth
as revealed in the Scriptures, we may draw a distinction between
reconciliation as effected by the blood of Christ, and reconciliation
as made known by a divine power to the heart. These are two
distinct things, though closely connected; and, in fact, the latter
flows wholly out of the former. Thus, Christ by his death upon the
cross reconciled the persons of his people unto God, for he
suffered in their stead that punishment which was due to their
transgressions. So speaks the apostle, "And that he might
reconcile both unto God in one body by the cross." (Eph. 2:16.)
So again, "When we were enemies, we were reconciled to God by
the death of his Son" (Rom. 5:10); and again, "And having made
peace through the blood of his cross, by him to reconcile all
things unto himself" (Col. 1:20); once more, "And all things are
of God, who hath reconciled us to himself by Jesus Christ." (2
Cor. 5:18.) I quote these texts, as I wish to impress it deeply
upon your minds that reconciliation to God, that is of our persons,
is wholly through the atoning blood of the Lamb. But there is
another reconciliation, not of our persons, but our hearts, of
which the apostle speaks (2 Cor. 5:20), "We pray you in Christ's
stead, be ye reconciled to God." He cannot mean there the
reconciliation of their persons, for that he tells us was already
done when God reconciled us to himself by the blood of the cross;
but he means that inward reconciliation of heart and affection
which is produced by the application of atoning blood to the
conscience; as we find him elsewhere expressing himself, "By
whom we have now received (that is, inwardly and
experimentally received) the atonement;" as we read in the
margin, which is the right translation, "the reconciliation." (Rom.
5:11.) These two things are to be carefully distinguished, for
there is no true peace of conscience as long as we confound
them.

iii. But as I have shown you the reconciliation of our persons, I

will endeavour now to show you the reconciliation of our heart
and affections.

1. The first step toward it is the reconciling of the conscience. We

know, painfully know, what a guilty conscience is. This guilty
conscience, the Scripture calls "an evil conscience" (Heb. 10:22),
not because it is evil in itself, but because it testifies of evil to us.
Now until this conscience is purged, or purified, by the blood of
Christ, there is no reconciliation of the heart unto God. The
apostle, therefore, says, "How much more shall the blood of
Christ, who, through the eternal Spirit offered himself without
spot to God, purge your conscience from dead works to serve the
living God." (Heb. 9:14.) We cannot, therefore, "draw near unto
God with a true heart, in full assurance of faith," until our heart is
"sprinkled from an evil conscience." (Heb. 10:22.) But when by
the blood of sprinkling, which speaketh better things than the
blood of Abel, the conscience is thus purged from guilt, filth, and
dead works; when the guilt of sin is removed and pardon
proclaimed, then the love of God is shed abroad in the heart, and
his mercy revealed to the soul. This guilty conscience is now
reconciled, for there is no longer law, wrath, and terror to
produce enmity and division.

2. But next comes the reconciliation of the heart and affections.

"My son, give me thy heart." (Prov. 23:26.) "My heart is fixed, O
God, my heart is fixed; I will sing and give praise." (Psa. 57:7.)
"Set your affections on things above, not on things on the earth"
(Col. 3:2.) But our heart and affections by nature are alienated
from the love of God, ever wandering after strangers, going out
after idols, and seeking their gratification in earthly objects.
These affections, then, of ours need to be reconciled, that is,
brought home, gathered up into the bosom of the Lord, made to
flow in sweet harmony with the love of God, so that they may be
fixed where Jesus sits at his right hand. But this reconciliation of
the affections only flows into the soul with the love of God shed
abroad in the heart. Love begets love. "We love him because he
first loved us." "The love of Christ constraineth us." Thus, when
the Lord is pleased to drop a sense of his goodness, love, and
mercy into the soul, it constrains us to love him with a pure heart
fervently. Without some measure of this heavenly love all religion
is but a task and a burden, the wearisome service of a slave, not
the loving obedience of a child. But "love is of God, and every one
that loveth is born of God and knoweth God. He that loveth not,
knoweth not God, for God is love." (1 John 4:7, 8.) Blessed is he
then who can say, "We have known and believed the love that
God hath to us. God is love; and he that dwelleth in love dwelleth
in God, and God in him." (1 John 4:16.)

3. But as a necessary consequence of this, there will be next the

reconciliation of our will of that powerful principle in the mind
which Bunyan well calls "Lord Will-be-will," for, whether lord or
lady, it is the ruling master or mistress, the grand director or
directoress of every other faculty; for it is, to use another figure,
the motive-power of both soul and body. But in a state of nature,
this will, with all its strength and power, with all the train that it
drags submissively along, is directly opposed to the will of God.
What God hates, it loves; what God loves, it hates. And as this
will influences our words and actions, the things which God has
forbidden us both to say and do, we both speak and practice. In
this state, therefore, our will and God's will are at thorough
variance. But what reconciliation can there be unto God inwardly,
feelingly, experimentally, as long as our will is opposed to his? In
order to be one they must be brought together, to harmonise
mutually with each other; and as our will is by nature evil, God
cannot and will not change his good into our bad. Therefore our
will is to melt into God's will, otherwise we are not one with God
nor fully reconciled to him. But as I cannot do this myself, I need
a power to be put forth in my soul to reconcile my will to the will
of God, which is and only can be done by the grace of the Spirit
showing me what God's will is and constraining me by every
godly motive to submit to it. But that will may be in many cases
very contrary to my will. The road I may have to travel may be a
thorny road, a path of tribulation, temptation, and deep affliction;
and things may occur continually which may very much fret and
gall my natural disposition, sadly mortify my pride, cut my flesh,
and wound my feelings. How, then, under these painful
circumstances, my carnal mind still remaining as it was full of
enmity and rebellion, is my will to submit to God's will? By the
power of his all-sufficient and all-powerful grace melting my will
into submission to his. Is this an impossibility? It often seems so.
But did not the Lord say to his apostle, "My grace is sufficient for
thee." (2 Cor. 12:9.) And is not that grace sufficient for us?
Surely it is, if the Lord put it forth. There is then a reconciling of
our will even to afflictions, troubles, and the thorny path of
tribulation in which the Lord is pleased to lead his saints. But
when their will is thus reconciled to the will of God, then they see
that the way in which he is leading them is a right way, though a
rugged way, for it is bringing them to that "city which hath
foundations, whose builder and maker is God."

I have enlarged upon these points to show you more plainly that
reconciliation has two very different aspects, which we must keep
carefully separated, or we shall get into sad confusion, for we
shall confound together the work of Christ upon the cross with
the work of the Holy Spirit upon the heart. There is, then, a
reconciliation of our persons by the blood of the Lamb, and a
reconciliation of our conscience, heart, and will by the inward
operations of the Spirit of God, specially as revealing Christ,
making him precious, and constraining us, by every godly
constraint, to move, walk, and act in the fear and love of God.

It is of the reconciliation of our persons chiefly that the apostle

speaks in our text. This is and ever must be the foundation of the
other; for it was only because Christ has reconciled us unto God
in the body of his flesh, by taking our nature into union with his
own divine Person, offering that pure and sacred humanity upon
the cross, and then dying as a sacrifice to God's offended justice,
that any discovery of mercy can flow into the heart, any peace be
experienced in the conscience, or any love be revealed with
power to the soul. But do observe in connection with this how the
cross of Christ, the blood of the Lamb, opens a way for the vilest
sinner to approach unto God. None of his sins, if he be enabled to
believe in the name of God's only-begotten Son, shall be brought
against him; they are all cast behind God's back, all washed away
in the fountain of atoning blood, all covered by the robe of
Immanuel's righteousness. "There is, therefore, now no
condemnation to them who are in Christ Jesus, who walk not
after the flesh, but after the Spirit." (Rom. 8:1.) But as we feel
our lost, undone condition, and get a view by faith, of Christ's
blood and righteousness, we want to enjoy the mercy, to live
under the sweet manifestations of the grace, and to have our
souls brought under the operation of the Spirit, revealing those
things with a divine power and sealing them upon the heart with
a liberating, saving, and sanctifying influence. Thus reconciliation
by the blood of the Lamb is not an unfruitfu1 doctrine or dry
speculation, is not a mere article of a sound creed that we may
receive upon the testimony of Scripture, but is a truth pregnant
with every grace, a tree loaded with gospel fruit, a fountain of all
inward and outward holiness. The more, therefore, that we know
of being reconciled to God by Jesus Christ and brought near by
the blood of the Lamb; the deeper insight we have into the
mystery of the cross, the more freedom of access to God shall we
experience and the more shall we rejoice in the hope of his glory.
If then a man look upon these things as a mere speculation, it
plainly shows he is not under the teaching of the Spirit. Were the
Spirit to bring the blood of the cross into his conscience and the
love of God into his soul, he would feel the blessedness of these
heavenly truths, and find them a most gracious and blessed
fountain of life and peace in his inmost spirit.

III.—Now comes our next point, which is Presentation; "to

present you holy." We must all one day stand before the bar of
God. But how shall we stand before that bar? In our own
righteousness or in Christ's righteousness? You know what was
the end of that guest who was found at the wedding feast without
the wedding garment on. You remember the words which
dropped from the master of the feast: "Bind him hand and foot
and take him away, and cast him into outer darkness: there shall
be weeping and gnashing of teeth." Such will be the sentence of
the master of the house against all who present themselves
before God without the wedding garment. But our blessed Lord, it
is said in our text, presents his people "holy and unblameable and
unreproveable in the sight of God."

i. If we examine a little more closely this divine mystery of

presentation, we may say that on three different occasions the
Lord thus presents his people before God.

When his people first appeared in him as the chosen members of

his mystical body, there was a presentation of the church before
the eyes of God as she would shine forth in all her beauty and
lustre in her future glorified condition. Thus was she comely in his
comeliness (Ezek. 16:14); beautiful in his beauty ("Let the beauty
of the Lord our God be upon us," Psl. 90:17); holy in his holiness
("For both he that sanctifieth and they who are sanctified are all
of one," Heb. 2:11); and perfect in his perfections ("That they
may be made perfect in one.") Again, when he died upon the
cross, rose from the dead, went up on high, and sat on the right
hand of the Father as her Head, Representative, and Surety in
the courts of bliss, then in a mystical sense the ascended Saviour
presented his Church before the eyes of his heavenly Father, as
washed from all her pollution in the fountain of his precious
blood, and justified by the imputation of his perfect obedience.
Upon this presentation the Scripture especially dwells as a truth
so blessedly adapted to our present state as feeling ourselves
defiled by sin. Yea even now the saints can sometimes sing,
"Unto him that loved us and washed us from our sins in his
blood." (Rev. 1:5.) So also the saints are said to have "washed
their robes and made them white in the blood of the Lamb." (Rev.
7:14.) Thus, in a mystical sense, our blessed Lord presented his
people when he went up on high before the eyes of the Father as
so washed in his blood, and clothed in his righteousness, that
they appeared in him without spot or blemish. And then will come
that crowning transaction in the great day, when he will present
them before the throne of his Father in all the beauties of
holiness, not only as redeemed by his blood but as sanctified by
his Spirit, glorious in soul as perfectly holy, and glorious in body
as conformed to his glorified image. Then will he be able to say to
his heavenly Father as he thus presents them in glory, "Behold, I
and the children which thou hast given me."

ii. But as our text speaks of presentation as following upon

reconciliation, it is doubtless this last presentation that the
apostle means, when he says "to present you holy, and
unblameable, and unreproveable in his sight." He seems also in it
to direct our thoughts to two different ways in which the people
of God are finally to be presented before the throne of the Most
High. The first seems to regard their external, the other their
internal state.

1. First, then, they are to be presented "unblameable and

unreproveable." I understand by these words their perfect
justification before the throne of God in the great day. For just
consider what must be the condition of a man in body and soul
for the eye of God to see no fault in him, when in his sight the
very heavens are not clean and he charges his angels with folly?
What must that man be, or in what state must he stand, to be
absolutely without blame before the eyes of infinite Purity? Surely
no man can have the presumption to think he can stand before
God thus without blame in his own obedience. Have not you, the
very darkest and most ignorant among you, sufficient light of
conviction in your own conscience to tell you this, so that even
you who are without divine teaching are sufficiently convinced of
sin to oblige you to flee to some general idea of God's mercy to
give you hope? How, then, can any man who has the light of life
in his bosom think for a moment he can stand before the throne
of an all-seeing God, unblameable, unreproveable, if he have to
stand there in his own righteousness? No; no man can ever stand
the scrutiny of a just and holy God if his own good works are his
only acceptance. It is only as washed from all our sins in the
blood of the Lamb, only as clothed in his spotless righteousness,
that we can stand before the throne, as John says, "without
fault." (Rev. 14:5.) The holiest man upon earth must sink under
the wrath of God if he have no other title than the obedience of
his own hands.

2. But the apostle uses the expression "holy," which I

understand, not merely in the sense of being sanctified by virtue
of union with Christ, as "of God made unto us sanctification," but
also of that inward holiness which is wrought in the heart by the
grace of the Spirit. The apostle bids us in this very chapter "give
thanks unto the Father which hath made us meet for the
inheritance of the saints in light." Thus we see, that there is not
only an external beauty in which the church stands as adorned
with the wedding robe of Christ's righteousness, but an internal
beauty as sanctified by his Spirit. Both of those are expressed in
the words of the Psalm, "The king's daughter is all glorious
within; her clothing is of wrought gold." (Psalm 45:13.) The
clothing of wrought gold is Christ's righteousness; the glory
within is her perfect sanctification of the Spirit. These are "the
beauties of holiness" in which she will appear. (Psalm 110:3.)
Thus we find, also, the apostle bringing together justification and
sanctification, "But ye are washed, but ye are sanctified, but ye
are justified in the name of the Lord Jesus and by the Spirit of our
God." (1 Cor. 6:11.) Without this inward holiness there is no
entrance into the courts of bliss, for without it there is no
meetness for them. Can a bird live in the water or a fish in the
air? The air is the element of the bird, the water the element of
the fish; but each dies out of its own element. So an unrenewed,
unregenerated, unsanctified sinner could not live in the presence
of God. The very brightness and splendour, the infinite purity and
unspeakable majesty of the God of heaven would kill him; would
strike him down to hell as it were with a thousand thunderbolts.

But the question may occur even to one who truly fears God, "Am
I meet for heaven? I do not feel to be so; I am not holy, but
corrupt and vile." Now we must bear in mind that in this life our
holiness is imperfect; it is not imperfect as regards its nature, but
its development. Immediately that the Holy Spirit plants divine
life in the soul it is meet for heaven, for he communicates in that
divine operation a germ of perfect holiness. Was it not so with the
thief upon the cross? On that very day when the Holy Ghost
quickened his soul he was with Christ in paradise; as perfectly
holy in spirit as ever he will be. We may compare this germ of
holiness, perhaps, to a seed in the husk. The seed germinates
and expands, yet it is still surrounded by the husk. But when the
husk falls off by the body dropping into the grave, then that seed
of holiness which the blessed Spirit has implanted will expand all
over the soul, pervading, and, so to speak, fully sanctifying every
faculty. And finally, when the body is raised up from the grave in
glory in the resurrection morn, both soul and body will be
perfectly holy, as being both fully conformed to the glorious
humanity of the Lord from heaven. Then will come the glorious
presentation of the saints of God before the Father's throne
without spot or wrinkle or any such thing.

IV.—Now to our last point, which is Continuance, or, as I before

named it, Continuation: "If ye continue in the faith grounded and
settled, and be not moved away from the hope of the gospel,
which ye have heard."

i. How personal is the appeal—how direct the challenge! All

religion must be personal. You may have faith: your faith won't
save me. I may have faith: my faith won't save you. I must live
for myself; I must die for myself. My religion, to save my soul,
must be one wrought in my heart by the power of God. Your
religion, if it is to save your soul, must be wrought in your soul by
the same divine power. Here, then, is the proof: Continuance,
abiding. "He that endureth to the end," and he only, "shall be
saved." If you have the faith of God's elect, if it be but as a grain
of mustard seed, you are saved already in the Lord Jesus Christ
with an everlasting salvation. But if you depart from your
profession, give up your religion, go into the world, fall into error,
abandon the things you professed to love, and return like the dog
to your vomit again, and, like the sow that was washed, to your
wallowing in the mire, what will it prove? That a saint of God may
fall away and perish? No, but that you are not a saint; that you
really never received the truth in the love of it by the teaching
and testimony of the blessed Spirit; that your faith is not the faith
of God's elect, but a mere natural persuasion of your mind, a
mere doctrinal speculation. For were you possessed of a true and
living faith, "the end" of it would be, as Peter declares, "the
salvation of your soul." (1 Peter 1:9.) This is the reason, then,
why the Scripture lays such stress upon enduring and continuing,
not as expressing any doubt whether the true saint of God will
persevere to the end, but to show that where there is not this
continuance there the faith is not the gift or work of God, but a
mere natural credence of the word of truth, without any
application of it with power to the heart. To continue, then, in the
faith, and that faith such as I have described as the gift and work
of God, is an evidence of it being real. But sometimes for the
past, we may take hope for the future. It may be many years
since the Lord first called you by his grace. What has enabled you
to continue up to thus day? How has your faith been preserved
amidst so many temptations and trials, so much internal and
external opposition, so many fightings without, so many fears
within? You well know that it is not by your own exertions, your
own striving, but by the pure grace of God that you still stand.
"Having obtained help of God, I continue unto this day" (Acts
26:22), was Paul's language, and will be the language of all who
have his faith and his continuance.

ii. But observe also that the apostle speaks of their being
"grounded and settled," that is, in the faith which they not only
professed but possessed.

The expression "grounded" signifies being firmly built upon the

foundation. God has laid a foundation in Zion, even the Person of
his own dear Son. To be "grounded," then, is to be firmly built
upon this foundation; not only to have a standing upon it but a
strong standing. The word "settled" seems to signify such a
settling down upon the foundation as never to be moved off it.
You know that a building, say a bridge, must settle before we
have any security that it will stand. When the centering of the
arch is struck away, it is an anxious time with the architect to
ascertain whether the bridge will settle well, and how much. So in
grace: people make a profession, seem to run well, are full of
zeal, ardour, and earnestness. But let us wait and see whether
they will stand against persecution, temptation, the strength of
sin, the corruptions of their heart, and the wiles of the adversary.
Sooner or later all will fall into ruin except those whom the Lord
keeps by his mighty power through faith unto salvation. The
blessedness, then, of having a living faith is, that the Lord will
surely carry on the work he has begun. But how needful it is to
examine ourselves whether we be in the faith, and whether by
the continued operations of the Holy Spirit we are well grounded
and settled upon the Rock of Ages!

iii. But the apostle adds another evidence of our being amongst
the number of those whom the Lord will present holy, and
unblameable, and unreproveable in God's sight, which is "not to
be moved away from the hope of the gospel which they have
heard." The gospel, when it becomes the power of God unto
salvation to a believing heart, raises up what the Scripture calls
"a good hope through grace." I hope I may say in your ears that
you have heard the gospel for many years from my lips. It is my
desire to preach the gospel, and nothing but the gospel, and, if it
be the will of God, with the Holy Ghost sent down from heaven,
that it may be attended with a divine power to your soul. With
God's help and blessing, may I never keep back part of the price,
but preach the gospel, the whole gospel, and nothing but the
gospel, whether you will hear or forbear. But when you have
received the gospel as a message from God, it has been a sweet
sound in your heart, for it has come, not as the word of man, but
as the word of God, "in power, and in the Holy Ghost, and in
much assurance." You have seen and felt its freeness, its
sweetness, its blessedness, its power, for it has at times broken
your heart, melted down your soul, softened your spirit. Pardon
and peace, light, life, liberty, and love have come with it; and
thus as you embraced and felt the power of the gospel in your
soul, it enabled you to cast anchor within the veil. Now if ever
you felt this power in your heart, you must never "be moved
away from the hope of the gospel;" that is, from the hope in your
soul which the power of the gospel has thus raised up. Whatever
temptations then assail you, whatever doubts or fears trouble
you, never, never give up your hope. By the mighty power of
God, in spite of every foe and every fear, you must still believe
against unbelief, still hope against despair, still love in spite of
coldness, darkness, and death. But you say, "I cannot do this nor
any one of them, for I am a poor, helpless creature." So are all;
but Christ's strength is made prefect in weakness. "As thy day is
so shall thy strength be." For remember this, that if you do not
"continue in the faith grounded and settled, but are moved away
from the hope of the gospel which you have heard," it will prove
that you never received it in power. But so far as you do thus
continue, it affords you a blessed evidence that you, who were
once alienated, are now reconciled to God. And as you are
enabled to believe this, and to feel the comfort of it, it will
strengthen you to look forward to that blessed day when Christ
will present you to his heavenly Father, not as now, a poor,
feeble, wretched sinner, but arrayed in his perfect righteousness,
with a body, not like your present, enfeebled by sickness,
impaired by age, and encompassed by infirmity, but raised up by
the power of God and perfectly conformed to the image of the
glorified humanity of his dear Son.

Now if these things are old they must continue to be so, for I
have no new doctrines to bring forward; if they are old, the Lord
can soon make them new by applying them with new power to
your soul, for he sends forth his Spirit, and renews the face of the
earth. I want for my own salvation and consolation no new
doctrines, but I do want to feel their power more, and live day by
day more and more under their influence. And as I hope to live,
so I hope to die by these doctrines. I shall want nothing else
upon a deathbed but a sweet experience of God's love, mercy,
and truth to support me when my eyestrings break, and heart
and flesh fail. Then to find the Lord the strength of my heart
here, and my blessed portion hereafter will make me willing to
yield up to him my departing spirit. I commend this gospel, then,
to you with all my heart. You cannot say that you have not heard
it from my lips. The Lord bless it to your soul, and seal it with his
own heavenly power upon your conscience.
The Anchor within the Veil

Preached at Providence Chapel, Eden Street, London, on Lord's

Day Morning, August 17, 1845

"That by two immutable things, in which it was impossible for

God to lie, we might have a strong consolation, who have fled for
refuge to lay hold upon the hope set before us: which hope we
have as an anchor of the soul, both sure and stedfast, and which
entereth into that within the veil: whither the Forerunner is for us
entered, even Jesus, made a High Priest for ever after the order
of Melchisedec." Hebrews 6:18, 19, 20

The Apostle, in this chapter, has been describing the miserable

end of apostates from the truth. But lest the things he had
declared concerning these apostates might discourage and cast
down the hearts of those true disciples to whom he was writing,
being tender in the faith, he adds, "But, beloved, we are
persuaded better things of you, and things that accompany
salvation, though we thus speak." And this leads him to shew
what these "better things" were, and the nature of those "things
that accompany salvation."

He therefore immediately mentions (verse 10-12) their "work and

labour of love," and bids them "shew the same diligence to the
full assurance of hope unto the end: that they be not slothful, but
followers of them who through faith and patience inherit the
promises."

This leads him to shew the nature of those promises, and the
character of the heirs of them. "When God made promise to
Abraham, because he could swear by no greater, he sware by
himself, saying, Surely blessing I will bless thee, and multiplying I
will multiply thee." He then shews that Abraham, like all his
children, inherited this promise through faith and patience. "And
so, after he had patiently endured, he obtained the promise."
He then proceeds to point out the foundation upon which these
promises stand—that they rest upon the immutable oath of God.
"For men verily swear by the greater; and an oath for
confirmation is to them an end of all strife: wherein God willing
more abundantly to shew unto the heirs of promise the
immutability of his counsel, confirmed it by an oath."

And this brings us to the words of our text: "That by two

immutable things, in which it was impossible for God to lie, we
might have a strong consolation, who have fled for refuge to lay
hold upon the hope set before us: which hope we have as an
anchor of the soul, both sure and stedfast, and which entereth
into that within the veil; whither the Forerunner is for us entered,
even Jesus, made a High Priest for ever after the order of
Melchisedec."

There is something so ample in the text that I feel this morning

like a weak man attempting to grasp in his arms a burden beyond
his strength. In fact, there is sufficient substance in these words
to occupy at least a dozen sermons, if God gave a man
experience and ability to bring out all contained in them. I can
therefore, only attempt to skim over the surface of the things
that are contained in the text. I cannot plunge into the depth that
coucheth beneath.

Let us therefore endeavour (as the words seem to lie with some
degree of sweetness and power upon my heart) to bring out a
few of the prominent truths contained in the text. I shall
therefore, with God's blessing, attempt

I.—To shew the character of the persons here spoken of.

II.—The nature of the refuge to which they flee.

III.—The firm foundation on which that refuge stands.

I.—We will look, first, then, at the persons spoken of in the text.
Their character we may sum up under two leading features; one
is, that they are "the heirs of promise;" the other, that "they have
fled for refuge to lay hold of the hope set before them in the
gospel."

1. Their first character is, that they are "the heirs of promise;"
that is, they are God's children, who are inheritors of the
promises made in the gospel. And it is through faith and patience
on their part that they come into the personal enjoyment of
them. They are heirs not through anything in themselves; they
are heirs because they are sons. "If sons then heirs; heirs of God,
and joint-heirs with Christ." Their sonship gives them heirship.
But before they can enter into the inheritance, before they can be
put into possession of the things laid up for them, they must have
two distinct graces of the Spirit wrought in their heart; they must
have faith to believe, and patience to wait for the things that their
faith lays hold of. Faith is necessary in order to give the promise
a place in their hearts; and patience is needful (for "he that
believeth shall not make haste;") that they may not precipitately
run forward, but may wait, endure, and suffer to the end, till they
come into the actual enjoyment of those promises which were
brought into their heart by the power of God.

2. But, besides this character, that they are "heirs of promise,"

the Holy Ghost has stamped a second upon them: "they have fled
for refuge to lay hold of the hope set before them." This implies
that they have been beaten out of false refuges. We know that
man by nature makes lies his refuge. Nothing is too treacherous,
nothing too delusive for you and me not to shelter in. The world
is a shelter for some; their own righteousness for others; a
delusive hope for a third; the good opinion of men for a fourth;
mere rites and ceremonies for a fifth. We know that man's lying,
treacherous heart will hide itself anywhere but in the hope set
before us in the gospel. Therefore, the Lord's people, who carry in
their bosom the same treacherous heart with all their fellow-men,
need to be beaten out of all these lying refuges, that the hail may
sweep them away, and the waters overflow them.

The expression "fled for refuge," throws a light upon the way in
which they came to lay hold of this shelter. It is an expression of
alarm. They did not walk gently forward, nor carelessly saunter to
the refuge, but they fled. This implies that there was that which
drove, which alarmed, which beat them out of the false refuges in
which they had hidden themselves. Now, we do not attempt to
define how long, or how deep, convictions of sin must work in a
sinner's conscience. But we may be quite sure of this—if they
have not worked so long, if they have not worked so deep, as to
bring him out of all false refuges, they have not yet done their
work. If these convictions, these apprehensions, these fears,
these solemn thoughts have not made us flee with fear, with
anxiety, with alarm to the refuge set before us, we as yet lack the
character stamped upon the heirs of promise.

To flee implies a pursuer, and a pursuer of that nature that unless

we escape him, he will plunge his sword into our bosom. Such is
the law with its awful curse. Such is Satan with his fiery darts;
such is death with his sweeping scythe. If we do not flee from
these pursuers, these avengers of blood, they will strike an arrow
through our liver. So that by these pursuers, these avengers of
blood, we are compelled, whether we will or not, forced, driven
out of every refuge of lies, to that which is set forth in the gospel.

But the Apostle tells them what this refuge is, "the hope set
before them." Hope here signifies the Object of hope, the Lord of
life and glory, "Immanuel, God with us." He is therefore called,
"The Hope of Israel, the Saviour thereof in time of trouble." (Jer.
14:8.) And he bears this title because in him all the expectations
of Israel centre; and to him every sin-burdened soul flees that he
may obtain shelter and refuge. This hope is set before us in the
gospel. The word of truth reveals Jesus as the hope of the
hopeless, the shelter of the shelterless, the refuge of the
refugeless. And when the Lord the Spirit is pleased to enlighten
our understanding—when the glorious Person, atoning blood,
justifying righteousness, and finished work of the only begotten
Son of God are set before our eyes, and a measure of faith is
raised up in our heart to look to Jesus as the object of our soul's
desire, then we lay hold of the hope set before us in the gospel.
But there are several things which must be wrought by a divine
power before we can do this. We must, first, feel a sense of our
danger—that is indispensable. We must, next, by a sense of our
danger, be driven out of lying refuges—that is equally
indispensable. We must then see what to flee to. Not to be
running here; not to be turning to the right hand, not to be
swerving to the left. But we must have a definite Object—know
the goal to which our feet are tending; not looking back to the
Sodom from which we have escaped; not hanging for help upon
man, or on any thing in the creature: but with our eyes looking
right on and with our eyelids straight before us, run as having a
certain object in view; a goal traced out in the word of God, and
held up before our soul's eye. And this is Jesus, whom we
embrace as set forth in the Scriptures as the only begotten Son of
God—"Immanuel, God with us;" as having, by his sacrifice upon
the cross made a propitiation for sin, destroyed death and him
that had the power of death, that is, the devil, and opened a way
through the veil, that is, his flesh, into the presence and
sanctuary of God.

When this is made known to the soul, viewed by the eyes of an

enlightened understanding, and faith is raised up to receive in
simplicity and godly sincerity what is revealed with power, then
we no longer run hither and thither, seeking help and finding
none, turning to the right hand or to the left: but we flee to a
definite Object, to the goal set before us, which is Jesus, the
great High Priest over the house of God.

But there is an expression, "to lay hold," that deserves notice.

There is something to be touched, tasted, felt, handled, known,
and enjoyed. It is not an object merely seen at a distance—a
something to be viewed merely by the eye, and not grasped by
the hand. But it is set forth as a tangible object, as something
laid hold of, embraced, grasped, and experimentally and
definitely felt. This vital and experimental laying hold
distinguishes living from dead faith; the mere natural
understanding speculating about Jesus, from the enlightening of
the eyes of the spiritual understanding by the Holy Ghost. Natural
faith may see Christ in the Scriptures; but it cannot see him by
the eyes of the soul. Nor is there a laying hold. A living soul alone
has power to embrace and grasp a living Saviour. Natural faith
fails here; it may think, talk, reason, and argue; but it cannot lay
hold, grasp, embrace, or bring in; it cannot enjoy a living union
between a living soul and a living Lord. It is a withered hand,
paralyzed and dead. But living faith reaches forth into eternity,
stretches beyond the vale of transitory things to lay hold, by a
sensible act and appropriating touch, of the hope set before us in
the gospel.

This we see signally shown in one case when the Lord was upon
earth—that of the poor woman with the issue of blood. (Luke
8:43-48.) The multitude thronged round Jesus; the crowd rudely
pressed upon his sacred Person. But only one trembling hand
touched him; and when that timid, yet believing hand touched
but the border of his garment, instantly virtue flowed forth from
his sacred Person, and healed her disease. So spiritually.
Professors may intrude upon the Lord, and thrust themselves into
his presence; they may, as the Jews of old, throng and press his
sacred Person; but it is only the peculiar touch of living faith that
derives virtue out of him. So that it is not merely fleeing for
refuge; nor is it merely seeking the hope set before us, but it is
the laying hold of it by a living hand. It may be indeed sometimes
almost with a convulsive grasp; it may be at others with a
trembling hand; it may be but for a few moments that living faith
touches the object of the soul's hope. The accompanying
incidents of time or intensity do not affect the nature of real faith.
As in the case of the diseased woman, it was not the strength,
nor length of her touch which healed her, but the faith which was
in it, so it is now. The distinctive character of true faith is, that it
touches, embraces, lays hold of, and thus brings supplies out of
Christ's glorious fulness into the poverty-stricken soul.

Now this Object of hope is set forth in the gospel. But you will
observe, that the Apostle having spoken of the Object of hope
transfers himself immediately to the grace of hope—"which
hope," he says, "we have as an anchor of the soul, both sure and
stedfast, and which entereth into that within the veil; whither the
Forerunner is for us entered, even Jesus, made a High Priest for
ever after the order of Melchisedec."

II.—And this leads me to show, as I proposed, secondly, the

nature of the refuge that the Lord's people flee unto. When the
soul flees for refuge to the hope set before it in the gospel, whom
does it see within the veil? Is it not the great High Priest after the
order of Melchisedec? Was not this typified by what took place on
the great day of atonement? You will remember, that none but
the high priest, while the temple was standing, was allowed to
enter within the veil, and that only one day in the year. He
entered in with the blood which he sprinkled upon and before the
mercy-seat. And this was typical of the entering of the Lord of life
and glory, after his resurrection, into the presence of the Most
High.

Now, hope as an anchor of the soul, both sure and stedfast,

enters within the veil where Jesus now is. And this is its
distinguishing character. It pierces beyond all temporal and
transitory things; and enters into things eternal and invisible,
within the veil. But the high priest upon earth, when he had
discharged his appointed office within the veil, came forth again
to sojourn among his fellow-men; but not so with the great High
Priest, his glorious and ever-living Antitype; he tarries within the
veil, at the right hand of the Father, the great High Priest over
the house of God—the Mediator, Intercessor, and Advocate of
God's family.

When then Jesus reveals himself to the eyes of living faith, they
view him in all the circumstances of his holy life, in all the
circumstances of his suffering death, and in all the circumstances
of his glorious resurrection and ascension. And thus hope fixes
itself upon the risen, ascended, and glorified Lord, the great and
glorious High Priest, who is passed within the veil.
The veil of the temple signified the separation that existed
between God and man, and the hiding of heavenly things from
his eyes. But when Jesus died upon the cross, the veil was rent in
twain from the top to the bottom, implying that a way of access
was opened into the very presence of God—that believers are no
longer, like the Jewish worshippers, to tarry without; but are
allowed to enter, in the actings of faith, hope, and love, into the
very presence of God himself.

Thus, a good hope through grace, as an anchor of the soul, both

sure and stedfast, passes through all sublunary things; it pierces
through that cloud which hangs upon the eyes of men; it
penetrates through the veil of unbelief that rests upon the heart;
it passes through the waves and billows of infidelity, as the literal
anchor through the waves of the sea, and it takes firm hold of
him who is within the veil. Its flukes anchor firmly in the great
High Priest over the house of God, as the natural anchor passes
through the deep waters, and buries itself firmly in the sand.

Jesus is here called "the Forerunner;" that is, he has entered

heaven before any of his people; for "in all things he must have
preeminence." He is the firstfruits and wave-sheaf of a whole
harvest of redeemed, and is gone to prepare a place for them,
that where he is they may be also. He has ascended up on high,
and set himself down at the right hand of the Father; and there
ever lives, the great High Priest, the true Melchisedec, to present
his intercession before the eyes of Jehovah. He presents not his
actual blood, but the merit of that blood. He presents his
righteousness; he presents his holy Person, yea, he presents
himself, the great and glorious God-Man, as the church's ever-
living and loving Head.

Now the nature of true gospel hope is, to anchor in this glorious
High Priest; not to rest upon anything in ourselves, not to rest
upon anything in others; but to pass through all these frail and
perishing things into the very presence of God himself; so as to
take firm hold upon the glorious High Priest within the veil.

But this we cannot do until we have a sight by faith of the King in

his beauty—until there is a discovery to the eyes of our
understanding, and faith be raised up in our hearts to look unto,
live upon, and embrace with all our soul's affections this glorious
Forerunner, who is entered within the veil. This looking unto him,
is an act of faith; this anchoring in him is an act of hope; and this
tender affection towards him is an act of love. These are the
three grand graces in the soul—faith, hope, and love. And
wherever there is faith to believe, there is hope to anchor, and
love to flow forth in the breathings of tender affection.

This "Forerunner is made a High Priest after the order of

Melchisedec." There are two points in which the order of
Melchisedec differed from the order of Aaron. 1. The Aaronic
priesthood was hereditary. It passed from father to son, and
therefore was always in a course of mutation and change. But the
Melchisedec priesthood is permanent, immutably fixed in Jesus.
As the apostle argues, Heb. 7:23, 24, "And they truly were many
priests, because they were not suffered to continue by reason of
death; but this Man, because he continueth ever, hath an
unchangeable priesthood." Thus, as Melchisedec was "without
father, without mother, without descent, having neither beginning
of days, nor end of life; but made like unto the Son of God,
abideth a priest continually;" so the priesthood no longer passes
out of the hand of Jesus, as it did in the course of nature out of
the hands of the Jewish high priest. It is not a temporary, nor
transitory, but an eternal priesthood. The second feature of the
Melchisedec, as distinguished from the Aaronic priesthood is, that
it is a royal priesthood. Melchisedec was "king of Salem;" and of
Jesus it was prophesied, "He shall be a Priest upon his throne."
(Zech. 6:13.)—Zion's King as well as Zion's Priest. Thus he not
merely intercedes as the great High Priest within the veil, but he
lives as a King to execute his own purposes. The hope of the soul
anchors in and rests upon this royal High Priest, knowing that he
is able to save to the uttermost all that come unto God by him—
standing at the right hand of the Father as an Advocate for the
poor and needy; and manifesting the virtue of his intercession, by
sprinkling his blood upon the conscience, discovering his glorious
righteousness, and shedding abroad his dying love.
Now everything that we have received out of Jesus, every
testimony of interest in him, every mark of his favour, every
glimpse and glance of his love, every thing that has raised up our
heart heavenward, every word that has come home with
softening, melting, dissolving power into our conscience—all flows
from this one thing—having fled for refuge, and laid hold of the
hope set before us in the gospel.

III.—But the apostle shews us, (and this is the third point which I
shall endeavour this morning to speak upon) the certainty and
security of this refuge that the Lords people flee to take hold of:
"That by two immutable things, in which it was impossible for
God to lie, we might have a strong consolation who have fled for
refuge to lay hold upon the hope set before us." The Lord gave
certain promises (and these are the promises to which the
apostle alludes) to Abraham. He said, "Surely, in blessing I will
bless thee." This was the leading promise, "Blessing I will bless;"
that is, absolutely, unconditionally. But in giving this promise to
Abraham, he gave it to all who have the faith of father Abraham.
Every believing soul that walks in the steps of believing Abraham,
God blesses with the same absolute, unconditional blessing that
he blessed his spiritual progenitor with—those rich blessings
which God has blessed his children with in heavenly places in
Christ Jesus. As the apostle declares, (Gal. 3:7, 9,) "Know ye
therefore that they which are of faith, the same are the children
of Abraham. And the Scripture, forseeing that God would justify
the heathen through faith, preached before the gospel unto
Abraham, saying, in thee shall all nations be blessed. So then,
they which be of faith, are blessed with faithful Abraham." Again
(ver. 14,) "That the blessing of Abraham might come on the
gentiles through Jesus Christ; that we might receive the promises
of the Spirit through faith." And again, (ver. 29,) "And if ye be
Christ's then are ye Abraham's seed, and heirs according to the
promise."

Now these promises rests upon two things; and these two things
the Apostle, declares to be "immutable," or unchangeable. One is,
the counsel of God; as we read, "to shew the immutability of his
counsel;" and the other is, the oath of God.

The counsel of God is, the determinate purpose of God to bless

whom he will bless, to have mercy upon whom he will have
mercy, and to save whom he will save. This is his eternal,
immutable, unchangeable counsel. The Three-One God fixed his
love upon definite objects; the purpose of his love being to bless
them and bring them to the eternal enjoyment of himself, in spite
of all opposition from without and within. This counsel stands firm
as the throne of Jehovah; an irreversible counsel, that though
man may change, the elements melt with fervent heat, the world
pass away, and the heavens be rolled up as a scroll, yet the
eternal purpose of a covenant Jehovah never can pass away.
Upon this counsel and purpose of God his promises stand; they
flow out of this counsel; they run parallel with this counsel; they
stand upon the same foundation with this counsel; and were
given in the mind of God ere the world itself had any being, and
when the "everlasting covenant ordered in all things and sure,"
was made between the Eternal Three.

We have the transcript of this counsel in the written word. Every

promise in that word flowed from his eternal counsel; and his
eternal counsel was the basis of every promise. So that when we
read the promises, we read the counsel from which those
promises flow, and on which those promises stand. When then we
read "the promises," we may be as sure that every promise will
be fulfilled, as we are certain that the eternal counsel itself will be
fulfilled. The eternal counsel is the source, the promises are the
streams; the eternal counsel is the foundation, the promises are
the superstructure. The superstructure will last as long as the
foundation stands, and the streams will flow as long as the source
remains.

But God has confirmed his immutable purpose with an oath. He

adopts here the custom of men, knowing how weak, how feeble,
how frail man's faith is. It was not sufficient to give a simple
promise, to make a covenant, and bestow promises resting upon
that covenant—he would do more, he would confirm it with an
oath, as we find in Genesis 22:16, "By myself have I sworn." The
margin of the text instead of "confirmed" reads, "he interposed
himself;" that is, put himself by an oath, as between the promise
and its fulfilment. And this he did, in infinite condescension, that
Abraham's faith might be stronger as resting not merely upon the
word of God, but upon the oath of God. Now, a man's word we
trust to, if he be an honourable man; but if we have, not that
man's word only, but the additional security and sanction of his
oath, it creates double confidence. So it is with the Lord. His word
is enough; but he has, in condescension to human infirmity,
knowing the weakness of his people's faith, not only given his
word, but also his oath: "Surely by myself have I sworn."

Every heir of promise has an interest in this counsel of God; and

every heir of promise is interested in this oath of God. I may—
you may—doubt, fear, and question in our own minds what right
we have to the promise of God. We read them in the word; we
see them to be unspeakably precious; we behold them spangling
the Scriptures of truth as the stars spangle the sky; we view
them loaded with blessings. But this thought arises, 'Am I
interested in them? I see them full of blessings; but what
testimony have I that they belong to me?' Now, this is the mark—
"that have fled for refuge to lay hold of the hope set before us in
the gospel." This is the mark of the heirs of promise: this is the
stamp that God has put upon them, "that they have fled for
refuge;" not that they have been extremely religious, not that
they have been remarkably consistent, not that they have done
this or that, or mean to do this and that, for the Lord. But this is
the divine stamp put upon them—that they have "fled for refuge."
In other words, that they have had such a work of grace upon
their hearts—such convictions of sin—such guilt, such soul
trouble, as has beaten them out of lying refuges: and that, being
beaten out of these lying refuges, they have looked to find some
shelter from the storm which they know will one day burst upon a
guilty world. Having heard the roar of the thunder upon the
horizon, and seen the flashes of lightning in the sky, and felt the
drops of falling rain upon the earth, while the world saw nothing
but a bright sky, they fled for refuge to the Saviour that God
himself has set before them in the gospel—to the Lord of life and
glory revealed in the Scriptures of truth—to the Son of God, as
having appeared in the flesh. They have fled by faith to his
atoning blood for the pardon of their sins—to his righteousness as
their only justification—to his sacred Person as their Advocate
and Intercessor at the right hand of the Father—to the promises
of the gospel as the breasts of consolation to which they desire
for ever to cling, and milk out their sweetness and blessedness.
This is their character.

Now, every soul that has experienced these things, that has been
taken out of refuges of lies, and fled for refuge to lay hold of the
hope set before him in the gospel, and not merely fled to, but
also by an act of living faith has laid hold of Jesus, has felt a
measure of his love and blood, tasted his grace, and been
ravished by his beauty—every such soul, however doubting and
fearing, however dark and distressed, however cast down with
the difficulties of the way, is "an heir of promise;" and being an
heir of promise, he rests upon the counsel and the oath of God.
In a word, every such soul that has "fled for refuge to lay hold of
the hope set before him in the gospel," has the counsel of God
upon his side. He is one of those on whose behalf the eternal
covenant was made. His title to it is—he has "fled for refuge;"
and the counsel of God, the secret counsel, and the manifested
counsel is, to save that man, whoever he be, however black his
sins, however vile his heart, however contradictory the path he is
walking in may seem to flesh and blood, however rough and
rugged his way, however assailed from without and within. That
man who has fled for refuge by an act of living faith to lay hold of
the hope set before him—it is the counsel of God that he shall be
saved. Nay more, lest that should not be enough, God has
interposed himself, has confirmed it by a solemn oath that he will
save such; not merely said it, but sworn it. That they may have
additional security, he has condescended to swear by himself,
that surely he will bless, surely he will save such souls.
Now the Apostle holds this out as strong consolation. He says,
"By two immutable things, in which it was impossible for God to
lie, we might have strong consolation." No: it is utterly impossible
for God to lie. The earth may be dissolved, and all creation
reduced to chaos before God could lie. He would cease to be God
if the faintest breath of a change, or the shadow of a turn should
pass over the glorious Godhead. But it is impossible for God to
lie. Therefore this holds out strong consolation for those that
have fled for refuge to lay hold of the hope set before them.

"Strong consolation" implies comfort applied to the soul; and that

in proportion to the strength of its faith, in proportion to the
depth of its trials. Who needs strong consolation? Is it not those
who have nothing which this world can comfort them with? Those
who have fled for refuge? fled out of the world, and therefore
they do not expect any consolation in the world? They have fled
out of sin, and do not expect consolation from sin. They have fled
out of self-righteousness, and do not expect consolation from
self-righteousness. They have fled out of those refuges of lies.
They may cast at times, through the wickedness and weakness of
the heart, a hankering look for other shelters; but they never
turn back. These need strong consolation. They need something
that can bear up their minds, something that can support them,
something that can enable them to endure to the end.

And what is the ground of this strong consolation? This is the

ground, that God has eternally determined and sworn by
himself—that he will save and bless those that have "fled for
refuge to the hope set before them in the gospel." This is the
foundation of their consolation, this is the ground of their hope,
that God has made such and such promises, and confirmed such
and such promises by his solemn oath—that those who flee for
refuge, and lay hold upon this hope, have an interest in and title
to them, and have a manifest assurance of being "heirs of
promise."

See how the Lord puts "strong consolation" on the surest ground.
He does not say, 'Look at your lives—how pious, how holy, how
religious they are!' nor does he even point at the depth of your
experience; nor does he condescend to notice anything
whatsoever of the creature. But this is the foundation on which
he places it—his own counsel, his own oath.

Now, did you ever in your life feel spiritual consolation? If ever
you did, it was by laying hold of the hope set before you in the
gospel. There was no consolation ever got by looking at fallen
self. If ever there was any true consolation, any hope raised up in
the heart, any solid comfort, it came out of the actings of living
faith embracing the blood and righteousness of Christ, tasting a
measure of his preciousness, seeing his glory and beauty, and
feeling the heart in some measure dissolved into nothingness at
his footstool. Not looking at ourselves; but receiving as empty
sinners out of his fulness: not trusting to ourselves, or our own
attainments; but going to Jesus, and receiving something into our
hearts out of him. Nothing but this can give us consolation; and
the more this is felt, the more this will give us "strong
consolation."

But, you will observe, that the Apostle speaks of this act of hope
in the Lord Jesus Christ as an anchor; and he says, this anchor is
"sure and stedfast, and entereth into that within the veil." In
other words, that this hope acts the same part towards the soul
as the anchor literally and naturally acts to the ship. Now, can we
always see the ground on which the anchor rests? Is not the
bottom covered by the dark, deep waves? And the deeper the
anchor sinks, is not the ground less seen? Is it not so spiritually?
Is not this the mark and characteristic of a living soul—"to endure
as seeing him who is invisible?" Is there not, must there not be, a
laying hold of invisible realities in the soul? And is not this laying
hold of, and is not this anchoring in invisible realities, a grand
mark of faith? If I can see with my eyes, I do not want to see
with my heart. If I can believe in my judgment, I do not want to
believe in my conscience. If I can touch by the hand of nature, I
do not want to touch by the hand of faith. These all fail, and
come short. The child of God, I am well convinced, will be
opposed at every step he takes. But he has fled for refuge to lay
hold of the hope set before him; and he believes, hopes, and
anchors in an invisible Jesus.
Unbelief is always looking for something visible. Reason always
questions 'how this thing can be consistent with that?' And thus
all the reasonings and argumentations of our fallen nature will be
bringing up strong artillery against living faith. But the Apostle
says, "Hope that is seen is not hope; for what a man seeth, why
doth he yet hope for?" (Rom. 8:24.) If we could see Jesus as
plainly with our bodily eye as we can see the texts of Scripture in
which he is spoken of, there would be no need of the special act
of God the Spirit upon our heart to give us faith. If we could
reason upon truth and receive it into our souls, as we reason
upon and receive matters of science and human learning, there
would be no need of the special operations of God the Spirit.
Therefore, just in proportion as our hope enters within the veil,
and anchors in this glorious Immanuel, will be the opposition
made to it by nature, sense, and reason. And nature, sense, and
reason, with the unbelief and infidelity of our hearts, will
sometimes work so powerfully, that the anchor seems almost
giving way. Nay, we scarcely at times seem to have any anchor
at all. The ship is so beaten about by the waves, that there
appears no firm hold of, no real anchoring in, the Person, blood,
and work of Jesus. And yet it holds. The ship is not beaten from
her anchorage; it does not fall upon the rocks, is not cast away
and lost. Still, by some invisible cable it holds, in spite of nature,
sense, and reason. Therefore, the Apostle says, it is "sure and
stedfast." It is firm and stayed; it may be out of sight, and seem
giving way; the waves and billows may rise so high as even to
hide the cable from our eyes; and as the cable dips beneath the
waves, it may seem sunk and lost; and yet all the while there is a
secret, firm, invisible hold. Have not a thousand temptations
blown across us to drift us from Jesus? I am sure they have
blown upon my soul. Have they not blown across yours? Have not
a thousand waves of unbelief almost tossed us upon the rocks?
Have we not sometimes been tempted by lust, and sometimes
been driven almost by despair, to give up our anchorage? Have
we not sometimes doubted and feared whether our hope was not
all a delusion, and whether we ever really by an act of living faith
cast anchor within the veil? Yet it will not, it does not altogether
give way. There is still some coming unto the Lord, still some
going up of tender affection, some actings of faith in his blood
and righteousness, some pantings of heart after him, some love
to him, some embracings of him as our only hope and help. Then
it has not failed yet; nay, the more it is tried, does it not prove
the anchor to be all the stronger? Does it not prove the
anchorage to be all the firmer? What can fail? Can the anchorage
fail? That cannot fail—it is the Person of Jesus. Can the anchor
itself fail? That cannot fail—it is the work of the Spirit to create it
in the soul. Can the cable fail—the mysterious connection there is
in the heart between the soul and Jesus—can that break? No:
that is twined by an eternal hand—that was woven by the fingers
of God himself—that cannot, cannot break. Then what can fail?
Shall the ship fail? If it be a ransomed soul—if the Lord of life and
glory be the pilot, he knows all the shoals, and can steer it into
the haven of eternal felicity. If that infallible Pilot who never yet
missed the harbour has purchased her, chartered her, and is
guiding her upon her homeward destination, how can the bark
itself, 'The Good Adventure,' be ever cast away?

Then, if none of these things can fail, what strong consolation

there is to those that have "fled for refuge to lay hold of the hope
set before them in the gospel!" How this noble anchorage, this
safe roadstead, opens its capacious arms to receive every living
child of God! Surely you must know whether this has taken place
in your conscience; if once you were in a lying refuge, and then a
storm came, and beat you out of it—then you must know whether
there were any goings forth, any lookings, any longings, any
stretchings forth, any reachings forward to lay hold of a precious
Saviour. You must know if these things ever had a place in your
soul—if you have had these feelings you must know whether
Jesus ever had a place in your heart—whether you ever viewed
him by the eyes of enlightened understanding—then you must
know whether faith ever flowed towards him, hope anchored in
him, and love embraced him. These things cannot take place in a
man's bosom, without his knowing he has had such things
working in his soul with power. He may have many doubts, fears,
and apprehensions as to the reality and genuineness of the work.
His faith may be sorely tried. But he must know whether he has
felt these things or not—whether these things have had a certain
definite effect upon him that has brought him out of lying refuges
to "lay hold of the hope set before him in the gospel."

Now, if God the Spirit has wrought these things in your heart in a
measure, though a feeble measure, you are a heir of promise;
and if you are a heir of promise, you have a title to strong
consolation; for your soul rests upon the immutability of God's
counsel, and the immutability of God's oath. Is it not a mercy it
should be so? Suppose it was thus—that I had made myself a
holy man; that I had, by a long course of penance, endeavoured
to atone for my sins; that I had, by rigorous acts of obedience,
worked out a measure of self-righteousness;—should I not be
always at uncertainty? and would not the issue be final despair?
But when it comes to this—"fleeing for refuge to lay hold of the
hope set before us in the gospel"—when it stands thus, that this
is the mark God has stamped upon the heirs of promise, and put
his finger upon this experience—if you have this, you have
everything. If this has been wrought in your heart by divine
power, you are a child of God—your soul will be saved as sure as
there is a God in heaven, a counsel of God in eternity, and an
oath of God in time. If these immutable things that cannot fail are
on your side; how it holds out an escape for every poor sin-
convinced sinner—every one that knows the plague of his own
heart—every one in whose soul the blessed Spirit has begun and
is carrying on a work of grace!

The Lord enable us to see it more plainly! The Lord enable us to

feel it more powerfully! The Lord enable us day by day to be
manifested as heirs of promise, to be continually fleeing for
refuge to lay hold of the blessed hope set before us—so that
when eternity shall come, and time have passed away, and be no
longer—then we shall see face to face in heaven what we have
seen by the eye of faith upon earth; and enjoy in full that which
in this life we have only realized by feeble and distant
anticipation.
The Anointing which Teacheth of All Things

Preached at North Street Chapel, Stamford, on Lord's Day

Morning, Nov. 23, 1862

"But the anointing which ye have received of him abideth in you,

and ye need not that any man teach you: but as the same
anointing teacheth you of all things, and is truth, and is no lie,
and even as it hath taught you, ye shall abide in him." 1 John
2:27

When Moses was with the Lord face to face for forty days upon
the holy Mount, he received from his lips particular and minute
instructions as to the construction of the tabernacle, with its
various vessels of service, such as the ark of the covenant, the
table of shew-bread, the altar of incense, the brazen laver, and
the golden candlestick. But these vessels of service could not be
employed in the ministry of the sanctuary, according to the
various purposes for which they were intended, until they had
been specially consecrated to a divine and holy use. The mode of
this consecration was as much a part of heavenly instruction and
divine revelation as the tabernacle itself and all its vessels of
service. Moses was, therefore, directed to make "an oil of holy
ointment, an ointment compound after the art of the
apothecary;" and with this "holy anointing oil" to consecrate "the
tabernacle, the ark of the testimony, the table and all its vessels,
the candlestick, the altar of incense, the altar of burnt offering,
and the laver, and thus to sanctify them, that they might be most
holy." The various ingredients of this "holy anointing oil," with
their exact weight and measure, were carefully prescribed; for in
this, as in every other instance, the minutest directions were
given by the Lord, from which there was allowed no departure
and no variation. But let me read the directions which the Lord
gave him, which you will find Exodus 30:23-25: "Take thou also
unto thee principal spices, of pure myrrh five hundred shekels,
and of sweet cinnamon half so much, even two hundred and fifty
shekels, and of sweet calamus two hundred and fifty shekels, and
of cassia five hundred shekels, after the shekel of the sanctuary;"
in all fifteen hundred shekels, which, computing the shekel at 219
grains, somewhat less than half an ounce troy, will amount to
about 57 lbs. troy weight. But in order to make this into an
anointing oil, he was to add "of oil olive a hin," about five quarts.
Now it does not seem likely that Moses was bidden to put all
these spices and oil together in what I may call a rough way,
without some manufacture or manipulation of these various
ingredients; for we must bear in mind that he was "learned in all
the wisdom of the Egyptians," who at that period were a highly
civilized nation, and celebrated for embalming the dead and other
arts which required a great deal of scientific and practical skill.
But there is another reason from which we may gather that these
ingredients were not roughly put together. The myrrh and
cinnamon, calamus and cassia, in such large quantities, merely
added to so small a quantity of oil, would soon have swallowed up
and absorbed the whole. Most probably, therefore, as Moses was
bidden to make the "holy anointing oil after the art of the
apothecary," these spices were put with water into what is called
an "alembic," itself an oriental invention, and in it distilled and a
spirit formed from them. To this spirit, then, thus distilled from
the spices was added the oil; the spirit having the effect, as we
know it has to this day, of preserving it from rancidity, and also
of communicating to it a sweet fragrance.

Of course all this, in common with the whole of the tabernacle

service, was entirely typical, and as seen in the light of the Spirit
highly and eminently instructive. This holy anointing oil, then,
was emblematic of the unction of the blessed spirit, whereby the
people of God are sanctified unto his use and consecrated to his
service, that they may be a holy people, and their worship and
offerings "spiritual sacrifices, acceptable to God by Jesus Christ."

But after the Lord had given Moses these instructions as to the
composition of the holy anointing oil, he added three prohibitions,
all of which, no doubt, have a very special and significant import,
and which therefore we shall do well to consider.
1. The first was this: "Upon man's flesh shall it not be poured." It
was not to be profaned to any common use. In that climate, as I
shall presently show, ointment was very much used for bodily
purposes; and but for this prohibition, some might have taken
this holy oil with profane hands and anointed with it the flesh of
their body. Now the Lord specially prohibited this profanation of
the holy anointing oil as most displeasing to his eyes. But what
spiritual instruction do we gather from this prohibition? Is it not
that the unction of the Holy Spirit must never be profaned to any
common or ungodly use? But is not this too often lamentably the
case? How many profess to be called by the Holy Ghost to the
work of the ministry, and as such are solemnly ordained or set
apart to the service of God who evidently know nothing whatever
of the gifts and graces of the Holy Spirit, but rather seek for an
entrance into one of the priests' offices that they may eat a piece
of bread. The unction of the blessed Spirit, like the holy anointing
oil, must not be thus profaned by being poured upon man's flesh;
and woe to those who so profane it. It is to be restricted to
spiritual persons and to spiritual purposes.

2. The second prohibition was: "Neither shall ye make any other

like it, after the composition of it." It was therefore not to be
counterfeited or imitated. It was to remain distinct and separate
from every other ointment, and any imitation of it was prohibited
by an awful penalty—the penalty of death; for such a
transgressor was "to be cut off from his people." But is there not
much significancy in this prohibition as well as in the former? Are
not the graces and fruits of the blessed Spirit daily counterfeited?
Ungodly, hypocritical men, men drunk with the spirit of delusion
and error, are daily trying to imitate and counterfeit the unction
of the Holy Spirit. How they come forth with their doctrines and
their views, their teachings and their preachings, their sermons
and tracts, their visions and revelations, as if they were under the
teaching and influence of the Spirit of God. But God abhors the
imposture. Nothing is admissible in the service of the sanctuary
but his own teaching and his own testimony; and all carnal
imitations of that holy anointing oil wherewith he alone
consecrates both offerer and offering will be rejected by him with
abhorrence. This prohibition has a wide, I may indeed say a most
tremendous scope, for it cuts off nine-tenths of the preaching of
the day. Where gifts are sanctified by the holy anointing oil, and
consecrated to the glory of God and the good of his people, on
them the blessing of God rests; but all attempts to counterfeit the
unction of the Spirit will be rejected. How often, too, are carnal
means sought after, in the preaching of the day, to touch the
natural feelings and move the passions. And thus sometimes by
pathetic, and sometimes by eloquent appeals to the natural
feelings, they so work upon the mind as to raise up a false faith,
a counterfeit hope, and a hypocritical love. But how awful will be
the end of such an imitation and of such imitators! "The deceived
and the deceiver are his" (Job 12:16); but both will be cut off
from the people, and have neither part nor lot in the kingdom of
God.

3. The third prohibition is equally significant. The holy anointing

oil was not to be put "upon any stranger," under the penalty that
he who so profaned it was to be cut off from the people. But what
do we gather from this prohibition? Is it not that the unction and
influences of the Holy Spirit, which are shadowed forth by the
anointing oil, are restricted to the family of God; that those who
are strangers to the covenants of promise, without God and
without hope in the world, have no right to, no part in the
sanctifying, consecrating influences of the blessed Spirit, and that
those who would make them common and universal must expect
to meet the resentment of a justly offended God?

I have brought forward these remarks in connection with "the

holy anointing oil" by way of introduction to our text, in which we
read of an "anointing," or, as it is termed in a preceding verse,
the word being exactly the same in the original, an "unction": "Ye
have an unction from the Holy One, and ye know all things" (1
John 2:20); for this sacred anointing or unction, whereby the
family of God are, as it were, consecrated to the service of God,
was typified by the holy anointing oil, which I have just now been
endeavouring to explain. Let us now, then, with God's help and
blessing, approach our text; and in so doing, I shall endeavour to
set before you,

I.—First, what this "anointing" is, in its general nature and

leading characteristics.

II.—Secondly, the special qualities which John here assigns to it,

which we shall find to be four: 1, that "it is truth and no lie;" 2,
that it "teacheth of all things;" 3, that, to a certain extent, it
supersedes all other teaching; and, 4, that "it abideth" in its
recipient.

III.—Thirdly, what is the blessed effect and fruit of being a

partaker of this holy anointing: it enables us, by its divine
teaching, to abide in Christ: "even as it hath taught you, ye shall
abide in him."

I.—The greatest blessing which God ever bestowed upon the

church was the gift of his own dear Son. This is that "unspeakable
gift," for which the apostle renders thanks unto God (2 Cor.
9:15), and the value of which never can in this life be fully
known. But next to the "unspeakable gift," of his dear Son, we
may say that the gift of the Holy Ghost is the second in value; for
without the teaching and testimony, work and witness of the Holy
Ghost in the soul, the unspeakable gift itself of the Son of God to
the church would be to us without value or validity. In other
words, in order that we may have a manifest interest in the
atoning blood and justifying obedience of God's dear Son, we
must have the influences and operations of the Spirit of God upon
our heart to make the finished work of Christ effectually and
savingly known. This heavenly teaching is the "unction" or
"anointing" of which John speaks; and which he tells us we have
"from the Holy One," even the Holy Son of God, and by which we
"know all things" which are indispensable for our salvation and
sanctification.

But I have to show you, with God's help and blessing, the general
nature and leading characteristics of this anointing; and, in so
doing, I must open up the literal figure to draw from it that spirit
of instruction which it is intended to afford.

In oriental climes, oil is much more used and indeed much more
required than in our humid climate. The air there is usually very
dry, and the sun has during a considerable part of the year
exceeding great power; the effect of which is to dry up the skin
and hair. To counteract this harshness and other attendant
consequences, the people were and are still in the habit of
rubbing oil into the pores of the skin, and profusely anointing the
hair that they may not be arid and dry, but be softened and
suppled, and preserved in health and beauty. But there is another
reason also for the bodily employment of oil in the East. In that
climate a vast quantity of light dust and sand is ever floating in
the atmosphere, and this light dust and sand, getting everywhere
into the clothes or resting on the exposed parts of the body,
insinuate themselves into the pores of the skin, and thus keep up
a continual irritation. Now this unpleasant consequence they
counteract by rubbing the body well with oil. There is also a third
reason which I hardly like to name, but still, as it is a valid one, I
will just mention it. Those climates are full of minute insect life,
winged and unwinged, which are a source of constant annoyance;
and against these unpleasant visitants oil, rubbed into the body,
is found to be the best remedy. For these reasons mainly, and
there are others, connected with their luxurious habits and loves
of perfumes, into which I need not enter, the use of oil and
ointment of various kinds is practised in the East to an extent of
which we happily are ignorant. This, then, being the habitual
custom of those climates, and thus known to everybody, the Holy
Spirit, writing in an oriental clime, has made use of this figure to
convey by it spiritual instruction, some of which I hope this
morning to lay before you; for there are many points in the figure
which throw a blessed light upon the teaching and testimony of
the Spirit of God in the heart. Let us look at a few.

1. The first obvious quality of oil which I will name is to soften.

We know that it is used among ourselves in various manufactures
to soften substances, such as hides and skins, which are naturally
hard, and which without it would be utterly untractable. But oil is
well and thoroughly rubbed into their pores, and renders them
soft and supple. So in medicine, it is made use of to soften hard
tumours, to discuss them, as it is called, and thus remove and
dissipate them; there being something in its very nature
mollifying. That it was so used in ancient times we learn from the
expression of the prophet, where, speaking of wounds and
bruises and putrifying sores, he says, "they have not been closed,
neither bound up, neither mollified with ointment." (Isai. 1:6.)
Oil, then, or ointment, is, in this sense, a blessed emblem and
scriptural figure of the softening operations of the Holy Ghost
upon the heart. We by nature, as some of us know by painful
experience, have a very hard heart—a heart which the Scripture
compares to the nether millstone, which is the hardest of all
stones, and necessarily so, lest the sand of the stone should be
mixed with the meal which it grinds. The Lord has graciously
promised that he will "take away the stony heart out of our flesh,
and will give us a heart of flesh." (Ezek. 36:26.) Our stony heart
then needs to be softened; and what can effectually do this
blessed deed but the teachings and operations of the blessed
Spirit, who takes away the heart of stone and gives the heart of
flesh, according to the promise, "I will put my Spirit within you,"
and again, "A new heart also will I give you and a new spirit will I
put within you?" Thus this sacred unction, this holy anointing,
softens the heart. "The Almighty," says Job, "maketh my heart
soft;" which he does by his gracious operations, softening and
humbling, melting and dissolving the soul at the footstool of
mercy. This, then, we may accept as a most certain truth, that all
contrition of heart and brokenness of spirit, all godly sorrow for
sin, real repentance, true humility, self loathing and self
abhorrence are produced by this most blessed unction from the
Holy One, and that without it of these fruits and graces there are
none.

2. But oil is also very penetrating. If you let a drop of it fall upon
a board or a table, how deeply it enters into its pores, so that you
can scarcely get it out again. There it will be for weeks and
months, leaving a marked and durable, clear and visible
influence. So it is with the operation of the blessed Spirit upon
the heart. It penetrates; it does not lie upon the surface of the
mind like a drop of water upon a pane of glass, without entering
into the very pores. One drop of this holy anointing oil penetrates
down into the deepest recesses of a man's heart, and especially
enters into the pores of his conscience, into which it thoroughly
sinks, making it at the same time soft and tender, as I have just
been describing. If ever the word of God's grace reached your
heart, it came there with a penetrating influence. It did not
merely inform your mind or instruct your judgment, but it
entered into your very soul. "The entrance of thy words giveth
light." (Psalm 119:130.) It is, therefore, compared in Scripture to
a "two-edged sword, piercing even to the dividing asunder of soul
and spirit, and of the joints and marrow, and is a discerner of the
thoughts and intents of the heart." (Heb. 4:12.) But oil
penetrates softly; it does not force its entrance in the same
violent way that the sword does, by piercing and cutting; but
rather by its soft and gentle influence, it penetrates deeply into
the understanding to enlighten it, into the heart to melt it, into
the conscience to make it tender, and into the affections to make
them spiritual and heavenly. Thus it is peculiar to the gospel. The
sword of the Spirit which cuts and pierces is the law; but the oil
which penetrates and yet softens is the power of the gospel. O for
more of the penetrating influences of the Spirit of God upon our
heart, so as to reach the very inmost depths of our soul and
"sanctify us wholly, so that our whole spirit and soul and body be
preserved blameless unto the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ!"
(1 Thess. 5:23.)

3. But oil has another effect. It is healing; it forms the basis

therefore of many healing applications. In the East, especially in
ancient days, the art of medicine consisted chiefly in external
applications. The people being for the most part ignorant how to
make internal medicines, little was taken in that form. But
frictions of various kinds were chiefly employed, the basis of
which was oil. Thus oil signifies spiritually what is healing. And
what so healing as the unction of the Holy Ghost? what brings
health and cure to a bleeding conscience, to a bruised heart, and
a broken spirit like what the Scripture calls the "oil of joy?" Thus,
in the same gracious prophecy in which the Lord declares that he
is sent "to bind up the broken hearted," he proclaims also that he
comes to give "the oil of joy for mourning." The good Samaritan,
when he had taken up in his arms the man who had fallen among
thieves, after he had examined and probed his wounds, poured in
wine and oil—the one gently to stimulate, and the other to soften
the flesh to heal. So the blessed Spirit, when he has well
examined the wounds made by the law in a guilty conscience,
pours in the oil of joy in sweet and blessed union with the wine of
the gospel, and brings it health and cure.

4. But oil in those countries was also much used as an article of

food. In those warm climates, butter cannot be made or kept;
what is called "butter" in the Scriptures being not as we see it,
but rather thickened milk. "She brought forth butter in a lordly
dish." (Judges 5:25.) This was a kind of thickened milk, boiled
over a fire to give it consistency, and put into a "lordly," or large
and noble dish, to satisfy the hunger of the weary and hungry
warrior. But a pat of our butter, however lordly might have been
the dish, would have been but a poor refreshment for the thirsty
and wayworn Sisera fleeing from pursuing Barak. Butter, then, in
the shape in which we use it being scarcely known in the East,
they use oil instead; and this being, at least when fresh, sweet
and salubrious, forms a large part of their food, and is eaten by
them with as much relish as we eat butter; some substance of
that nature being indispensable for our health, in the
maintenance of our necessary bodily warmth. But what feeds the
soul better than the unction of the blessed Spirit? As he takes of
the things of Christ and reveals them to the heart; as he sets
before the eyes and puts as it were, into the very mouth the flesh
and blood of the Lamb, how he feeds the soul! And not only so,
but he warms as well as feeds; for as the warmth of our bodies
could not be kept up except by partaking of fatty or oily food, so
our souls cannot be warmed except by the love of God which is
shed abroad in the heart by the Holy Ghost. The Lord has
promised that he will make in Mount Zion unto all people "a feast
of fat things, of fat things full of marrow." (Isai. 25:6.) By this
feast of fat things, the soul is warmed as well as fed; and thus
the unction of the blessed Spirit satisfies the soul as with marrow
and fatness (Psalm 63:5); by it the people of God are made fat
and flourishing (Psalm 92:14); and are abundantly satisfied with
the fatness of God's house. (Psalm 36:8.)

5. But oil has still another use. Among the other offerings which
the Lord bade the children of Israel bring for the service of the
tabernacle, "was oil for the light." You will remember that
amongst the vessels of service was a golden candlestick, or, as it
should have been translated, "a lamp," for candles in those days
were utterly unknown. Now this lamp gave light to the holy place,
and therefore needed to be continually fed, for it was never
suffered to go out. For this purpose, then, the purest oil—what
Moses calls "pure oil olive beaten," that is, in a mortar, not
ground in a mill, was used as giving the brightest and clearest
light. (Exodus 27:20.) But is not this a striking type and figure of
the light of the Holy Ghost? For what light is there comparable to
the pure and holy light that he gives? And does he not give light
to the church of God, as represented by the golden candlestick in
the sanctuary with its six branches and one central lamp, for it
had seven to indicate its perfection? (Exodus 25:37.) All the light
that we have is from the presence of the Holy Spirit in the
sanctuary. How blessed it is personally and experimentally to
realise this! What a light, for instance, he casts sometimes upon
the Person and work of Jesus! What a light upon the sacred page,
irradiating it as if with a beam from heaven! What a light, too,
upon the truth as it is in Jesus, making it to shine, like the face of
Moses, with a heavenly lustre; and what a light also upon the
teaching and dealing of God upon your own heart, when you are
favoured to see light in God's light.

6. But I must just mention one more general characteristic of oil

before I pass on to its more peculiar features as opened up in our
text. It was used on festal days to adorn and beautify the person.
Thus we find that the maidens who were taken into the house of
King Ahasuerus were previously anointed for six months with "oil
of myrrh and six months with sweet odours." (Esther 2:12.) So
the wise man says, "Let thy garments be always white, and let
thy head lack no ointment;" and thus Amos, speaking of those
who on their feast days "lie upon beds of ivory and stretch
themselves upon their couches," says, that "they drink wine in
bowls and anoint themselves with the chief ointments." (Amos
6:6.) Ointment, therefore, being used on these festal occasions,
became a figure of joy and gladness. This may explain the
meaning of "oil of joy" and "the oil of gladness;" and of "oil to
make man's face to shine." (Psa:104:15.) Spiritually, therefore,
oil or ointment represents heavenly feasting, holy joy; what the
Apostle calls "joy in the Holy Ghost." (Rom. 14:17.) So the
Thessalonians "received the word in much affliction, with joy of
the Holy Ghost." (1 Thess. 1:6.) This is real joy, for it is of God,
and a joy which no man taketh from its happy recipient.

II.—But having thus far dwelt upon what I have termed the
general characteristics or leading features of oil or ointment, I
shall now proceed to our next point, which was to show the
peculiar qualities of "the anointing" in our text. You will recollect
that I named four, which I shall now endeavour, as the Lord may
enable, to lay before you. They are all deeply significant; and if
the Lord has blessed you with any measure of this holy unction,
you will be able to recognize them as more or less realised and
experimentally felt in your own bosom. Look, then, well and see
whether you can trace there the anointing; for if you possess it, it
will have produced some measure of these four important
qualities, laid down by the pen of John.

i. First, "it is truth and is no lie;" in other words, there is a solemn

and blessed reality in it. You may be tried about many things in
your experience, and in fact we are tried about almost everything
connected with it, both in providence and in grace, for "the Lord
trieth the righteous;" and it is the trial of our faith, which is
"much more precious than gold that perisheth." But in spite of all
our trials upon the point, all the exercises of our mind upon the
subject, or all the suggestions of unbelief and infidelity against it,
those who have ever experienced the anointing of the Holy Spirit
know that "it is truth,"—that there is a divine and substantial
reality in it. And how do they know this? Mainly by two
evidences—the witness of the Giver and of the gift. Let me
explain this double witness. Does not John say, "Ye have an
unction from the Holy One;" and in our text, "The anointing which
ye have received of him?" Who is this "Holy One" but the Holy
One of Israel, the Holy Son of God? This anointing, then, being
received of or from him, testifies to the Person of the Giver. The
main work of the Holy Spirit is to reveal Jesus; to take the things
which are his, and to show them to the soul; to glorify him by
some manifestation of his presence and power. Thus the
anointing manifests, and by manifesting testifies of that glorious
Son of God who received the Spirit without measure; who was
anointed to be Prophet, Priest, and King; and who being by the
right hand of God exalted, and having received of the Father the
promise of the Holy Ghost, sheds it forth in the hearts of his
people.

But this anointing is also known to be "truth and no lie," from the
very nature of the gift and the witness which it bears of it. Thus it
enlightens the eyes of the understanding spiritually to discern the
things of the Spirit of God; raises up faith in the heart, whereby
the Son of God is believed in unto eternal life; communicates a
sweet hope to the soul, enabling it to cast anchor within the vail;
and sheds abroad that love whereby Jesus and all that savours of
him are embraced with every gracious and tender affection. As
then divine and heavenly realities are revealed to the heart and
sealed upon the breast by the anointing which manifests,
discovers, and applies them, the anointing itself is seen and felt
to be a most blessed reality, or, as John speaks, "truth and no
lie." It may seem, perhaps, to some enthusiastic, and to others
unsafe to trust to our feelings, and make them an evidence; and
so it would be were they mere natural feelings. But they are not
natural but supernatural, not carnal but spiritual, not earthly but
heavenly, and therefore carry with them an evidence of their
own. Is not this scriptural? Does not the apostle declare that "the
Spirit itself beareth witness with our spirit that we are the
children of God?" (Rom. 8:16); and does not John say, "He that
believeth on the Son of God hath the witness in himself?" (1 John
5:10.) Indeed it is only in this way and in the light of this
evidence that we really know "that the Son of God is come, and
hath given us an understanding that we may know him that is
true." (1 John 5:20.) Whatever, then, Satan may suggest, or
unbelief whisper, or the darkness of our mind insinuate, or
however ungodly men may ridicule or rail, we are brought, so far
as we are favoured with this unction in sweet operation, to this
point—that "it is truth and is no lie."

1. But as a convincing evidence, look for a few moments at what

you hope the Lord has done for your soul, for these words will
apply with greater or less clearness to every part of the work of
grace. Look, then, at the first convictions which were wrought in
your heart by a divine power. Was there not truth in them and no
lie? It is no lie that you felt the weight and guilt of sin upon a
burdened conscience; that you cried for mercy, and that with
many sighs and tears; that you were conscious of the heart-
searching presence of a holy God; and found no rest except in
pouring out your heart before him. This was the effect of the
anointing which you received of him; and therefore of it, even of
the first drop, you can say, "It is truth and no lie;" for were not
your feelings a reality, if ever you felt a reality in all your life?

2. Now pass on to any gracious discovery of the way of salvation

to your soul; any manifestation of Christ to your heart; any
application of the word of grace with power; any inward whisper
of the Spirit to your spirit, rising up a hope in the mercy of God.
Was not that a truth and no lie? You may be tempted at times to
believe it was not real; that it was but a deception or a delusion.
But when you are favoured with the same anointing again, and
the same blessed feelings return, then you can say of the past as
well as of the present, "It was truth and no lie."

3. Or look at any promise ever applied to your soul in a season of

darkness and depression, to relieve your mind, to comfort your
spirit, and bring you out of trouble. You may be sometimes tried
as to the reality of its being from God; but when the Lord again
shines upon your heart, and brings once more the unction of his
grace, then you can say, "It was truth and no lie."
4. But take another case. You may be sometimes tried about
every doctrine that you have believed or professed to believe.
Satan may stir up such unbelief in your carnal mind and such
storms of infidelity that you doubt of everything, and seem tossed
up and down on a sea of uncertainty, like Paul on the Adriatic, so
that neither sun nor stars for many days appear, and no small
tempest lies upon you. But when the blessed Spirit is pleased
once more to anoint your soul with this heavenly unction, then
you can say boldly, "It is truth and no lie." Man never invented
these precious and heavenly truths. Good men would not invent
them and bad men could not. Angels would not foist upon us lies
as the word of God; devils could not, for it defeats all their
devices, and proclaims their sin and ruin. From whom, then,
came these blessed truths? From God. I feel their reality and
certainty; I know they are true, for they came into my heart in
demonstration of the Spirit and of power. What, then, he has
been pleased to teach me out of his holy word by his Spirit and
grace, I can set to my seal that "it is truth and is no lie."

This, then, is one peculiar and most blessed quality of the

anointing of the holy Spirit, that it brings into your soul that
certainty of God's word being his own most blessed truth, that
you can stand firmly upon it in trial and temptation, sickness and
death itself. "If we receive the witness of men," says John, "the
witness of God is greater." This witness is the witness of the
Spirit, as we read, "It is the Spirit that beareth witness because
the Spirit is truth." (1 John 5:6, 9.) Thus, what God has revealed
in the word, and what the blessed Spirit has revealed out of it to
your heart, is inwardly known and felt to be truth and no lie.
Stand here, Christian: here keep your ground against sin and
Satan, an unbelieving, infidel heart, a mocking, scoffing, scornful
world. Here plant your foot and stand firm, that the anointing
which you have received from the Holy One "is truth and is no
lie."

5. The "holy anointing oil" which Moses made, you will recollect,
as being compounded of the choicest spices, possessed a
fragrance which must have made itself manifest when applied to
the vessels of the sanctuary. This, indeed, is the very character of
perfumed ointment, for, as Solomon says, "it betrayeth itself."
(Prov. 27:16.) So when Mary took "the pound of ointment of
spikenard, very costly, and anointed the feet of Jesus, the house
was filled with the odour of the ointment." Thus the anointing of
the blessed Spirit makes itself manifest by its heavenly fragrance
in the hearts, lips, and lives of God's people; for not only do
"ointment and perfume rejoice the heart" (Prov. 27:9), but as the
name of Jesus is "as ointment poured fourth," so "the savour of
his good ointments" makes itself manifest in their words and
works as truth and no lie.

ii. But I pass on to show another special quality which John

attributes to this anointing: "it teacheth of all things;" that is, all
things needful for our salvation and sanctification. He does not
mean that it teaches us natural, scientific truth; that by this
teaching we become linguists, historians, mathematicians, or
philosophers. Such is not the mind and meaning of holy John
here. What he means is, that this anointing teaches us of all
things for our good and God's glory; of all things which to know is
life eternal; of all things which will carry us safely and honourably
through this vale of tears; of all things which to taste, handle,
experience and enjoy, will be for our support under trouble, our
deliverance from temptation, and our sure and safe passport into
heavenly bliss. And we need not want to know much more. All
other knowledge fails us at the grave's mouth. It is well for time;
but what will it do for us for eternity? Few men have a greater
admiration than myself for mental ability, literary attainments,
and the results of science and knowledge in the various
departments of life. But I have long seen and felt how they all fail
when death knocks hard at the door and will force an entrance. I
have personally known men of learning, science, and mental
ability; but I have seen that all their attainments left them
without a knowledge of the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom
he hath sent. If, therefore, I have envied them their abilities and
their attainments, I have not envied them their state or their
end; and, in my right mind, would sooner have one drop of this
holy anointing in my heart than all the knowledge which they
possess, or all the powers of mind which they wield. But as this
anointing teaches us "of all things," which mental ability cannot
grasp and human learning cannot impart, we may now spend a
few moments in looking at some of the things which it makes
experimentally known.

1. It teaches us the true knowledge of God. Without this special

anointing we have no right views, right apprehensions, or right
feelings of that great and glorious Being with whom we have to
do. His omniscience, his omnipotence, his purity, his holiness, his
inflexible justice, and all his other glorious and eternal attributes
are hidden from our eyes whilst we are still in nature's darkness
and death. We may indeed have some natural conceptions in our
mind, and some occasional convictions in our conscience of the
holiness of God, and some indefinite apprehension of his
universal presence and almighty power; but we do not really
believe or feel or act upon them. It is at best but a general,
floating idea, which has no effect or influence upon our heart or
life. I do not think I am going too far when I say that we need the
anointing of the Holy Spirit to show us the very existence of God.
Does not the apostle tell us that we are by nature "without God in
the world," literally "atheist?" (Eph. 2:12); and does he not also
declare that "through faith we understand that the worlds were
framed by the word of God;" and that "he that cometh to God
must believe that he is." (Heb. 11:3, 6.) And is not this faith the
gift of God and a fruit of the Spirit? (Eph. 2:8; Gal. 5:22.) Does
not our Lord also declare that "to know the only true God" is a
part of that "eternal life" which he has to give? (John 17:2, 3.)
And does not our experience confirm this? How plain, then, is it
both from Scripture and experience that we need the teaching of
the blessed Spirit to convince us of the very being of a God, and
that we are sinners before him.

2. But this anointing teaches us specially to know Jesus Christ

whom he has sent. This is the second branch of eternal life; and,
as being the gift of Jesus, it is thereby implied that it is brought
into the heart by the power of his grace. We are also expressly
told that "no man can say that Jesus is the Lord but by the Holy
Ghost." (1 Cor. 12:3.) Our own experience confirms these
declarations, for we deeply and daily feel that we have no
knowledge of his eternal Sonship and glorious Deity; no spiritual
view of his pure and sacred humanity; no living apprehension of
his complex Person, as Immanuel God with us; no gracious
discoveries of his atoning blood as cleansing from all sin; of his
obedience as justifying us from all things from which we could not
be justified by the law of Moses; of his dying love shed abroad in
the heart; of his sufferings upon the Cross as bearing our sins in
his own body on the tree; of his resurrection from the dead, so as
to know its power; of his personal and present intercession at
God's right hand, so as to have a manifest interest therein,
except so far as they are revealed to us by the teaching and
testimony of the blessed Spirit. Yes; these grand and glorious
truths, in a true knowledge of which all salvation lies, are all
hidden from our view, for there is a veil of unbelief and ignorance
over our heart until the blessed Spirit destroys this yoke by his
anointing. (Isa. 10:27.) But his holy unction teaches us of all
these things, instructs us into their beauty and blessedness, their
reality and truth, their sanctifying influence and power. How
beautifully and blessedly did the Lord set this before his disciples
in those gracious, those heavenly chapters in John's Gospel,
whereby he sought to comfort their mourning hearts. How he
promised them that he would send them another Comforter, who
should glorify him, take of the things that belonged to him, and
manifest them to their hearts. How those chapters, breathing
forth in themselves a heavenly fragrance, are filled even to
overflowing with most gracious declarations and promises in
reference to the work of the blessed Spirit in making Christ
known to the soul. These gracious declarations and divine
promises were not spoken for their comfort only; but as the Lord,
in his intercessory prayer, prayed not for his disciples only, but
"for them also which should believe on him through their word,"
so to believers in every age do the same promises belong. It will
be our richest mercy to have that holy anointing, whereby they
become fulfilled in our heart.
3. Nor, again, do we know anything of our lost and ruined state
by nature, or what our hearts really are in their thorough
nakedness and hideous vileness before a holy God, except as this
holy anointing instructs us into this deep and most painful
mystery; for there is a "mystery of iniquity" as well as a "mystery
of godliness." Without the light and life of this heavenly teaching
we do not see or feel the depth of guilt and crime, misery and
wretchedness, into which we are sunk in the Adam fall. We do not
know the deceitfulness and hypocrisy of our desperately wicked
nature; what it is capable of thinking, of saying, or of doing.
Observe my word, "capable;" I do not say that we either speak or
do what we feel working within; but we see that there is a
capability of wickedness in the human heart, yes, and in our
heart, which exceeds all that ever has been thought, said, or
done. Nor, again, do we see or feel our thorough and complete
helplessness to save or deliver ourselves, and our inability to
believe, to hope, or to love unto eternal life. In a word, we have
no right views of God, and we have no right views of self: we
neither see sin nor salvation, the malady nor the remedy; what
we are in Adam the first, or what we are in Adam the second,
except by the anointing which teacheth of all things.

4. But, again, by this teaching we are led into "the truth as it is in

Jesus." There is not a branch of divine truth, not a part or
particle, that we spiritually and savingly know but by virtue of
this anointing. But "the truth as it is in Jesus" is a most
comprehensive expression, for it includes the whole of God's
revealed truth. It comprehends, therefore, every doctrine of our
most holy faith, every promise and every precept. As then this
anointing "teacheth of all things," it leads us into an experimental
knowledge of the truth as it shines forth in the Person and work
of our gracious Lord. And as by this anointing we are led into all
truth, so by it we are preserved from all error. By this anointing
also the precepts are made as dear to us as the promises; the
whole truth of God is opened up and made known; and though I
do not mean to say that any of us experience all that is contained
in the truth, for how little do we really know, yet this I will say,
that we know nothing as we ought to know of any one branch of
divine truth, whether in doctrine, experience, or practice, in type
or figure, promise or precept, except by virtue of this anointing. I
will also add that what it teaches us that we know to some
purpose; for the sanctifying, liberating power and influence of the
blessed Spirit ever attend this anointing, making the soul wise
unto salvation. How, then, we need to be ever begging of the
Lord to give us this unction from the Holy One, whereby we know
all things! I, as a minister, who have to stand up in the name of
the Lord to teach you, and you as a people, who desire to know
the truth for yourselves in its saving efficacy and sanctifying
influence,—what need we both have to beg of the Lord to favour
us with this anointing; for not only does it sanctify us to the
service of God, as the holy anointing oil sanctified Aaron and his
sons, but it also makes us meet for the inheritance of the saints
in light: not only does it give us a spiritual understanding of the
mysteries of the gospel, but it sets up the kingdom of God in the
heart, which is righteousness and peace and joy in the Holy
Ghost. Much we may learn by the wisdom of men; but all will fail
us in a dying hour that we have not learnt by the teaching of
God. But what we know by the Spirit's teaching and testimony
will last through time, and I may say, through eternity.

iii. But I pass on to another special quality of this divine

anointing, which is somewhat connected with that which I have
just explained. This anointing, then, to a certain extent—I qualify
the expression—supersedes all other teaching: "Ye need not that
any man teach you." There is some allusion in this to the promise
made in connection with the new covenant, that "they shall not
teach every man his brother and every man his neighbour,
saying, Know the Lord, for they shall all know me from the least
to the greatest." (Jer. 31:34.) This teaching, then, supersedes all
other teaching to this extent, that is not necessary or
indispensable to a right knowledge of the truth as it is in Jesus.
Man may teach us many things; and, in fact, without instructors
and tutors we cannot possibly learn the chief branches of
education. Persons sometimes try to teach themselves modern
languages; but a man might as well teach himself music as to
write and speak French and German without an instructor. I have
know grown-up men, brought up without any real education,
who, having become ministers, thought they would teach
themselves Hebrew or Greek, so as to be able to read critically
the Old and New Testaments. But what did they obtain with all
their self instruction? Why, a vast amount of conceit, but no real
knowledge. Languages, especially the ancient languages, cannot
be so learnt. We must learn them in boyhood, when the mind is
pliable, and the memory active and strong, and have them
ground into us by many years' hard instruction, before we can be
said to know them critically or usefully. That is the way in which I
learned what little I know of the ancient languages, having had
them ground into me for 15 or 16 years, first at a public school
and then at College. But though I myself may possess a little of
this knowledge, which I would not now be without, for I often find
it very useful, yet I hope I estimate it at its right value, and see
what a mercy it is for the poor, illiterate, uneducated family of
God, that they have not to learn the language of Canaan by such
laborious means as Greek and Latin are drilled into us in
boyhood; that they need sit at no minister's feet to learn the
pronunciation, the grammar, the syntax, and prosody of the
heavenly tongue, so as to speak and write it correctly; but that
the blessed Lord himself brings them to his feet, and there
teaches them rightly to understand and rightly to speak the
language of Zion. To a certain extent, then, for I qualify the word,
this anointing, in great measure, supersedes other teaching; but
does it supersede all? If so, why are you here this morning? What
have you come to hear me for? Am not I, in a certain sense, your
spiritual teacher and instructor? Don't you come to hear me open
up the word of God—to teach you what I hope the Lord has
taught me? We may learn much from one another, as the apostle
says, "That all may learn and all be comforted." (1 Cor. 14:31.) I
can say for myself that I can sit at the feet of any one who I
believe is taught of the Lord, and am glad to receive instruction
from his lips, however poor or unlearned he may be. Nay, I have
often got very great good from the poor saints of God, and have
gathered profitable lessons from their conversation. Thus this
teaching does not supersede such teaching as the teaching of the
ministry, nor the teaching we get from conversation upon the
precious things of God with those who fear his great name. But it
supersedes human teaching in this way—that of itself, without
any other instruction, it can and does lead the saints of God into
a personal and experimental enjoyment of the power of God's
truth. Thus in the absence of a gospel ministry, and the
deprivation of every other means of grace, this anointing is all
sufficient in itself to teach the saints of God the things which are
for their eternal peace.

iv. One more special quality of this anointing remains to be

considered—its abiding character: "The anointing which ye have
received of him abideth in you." This is the very nature of oil—
that you cannot get it out. Have you not sometimes dropped a
drop of oil upon the boards, and all your rubbing and all your
scrubbing cannot get it out again or efface the mark; so it is in a
spiritual sense. If the Lord has dropped a drop of his holy oil upon
your heart, and it has penetrated into the very pores of your
conscience, nothing will ever get it out. And what a mercy it is
that nothing ever will get it out. What floods of sin will sometimes
roll over the holy spot into which the oil has dropped; but all the
floods of sin can never wash it out. What waves of temptation
and billows of God's displeasure may roll into and over the soul;
but these waves and billows will never wash out the consecrated
spot. What opposition from ungodly men—what fiery darts from
hell—what doubts and fears, misgivings and apprehensions; but
all these combined can never efface the holy anointing oil.
Whatever a man may be in himself; however vile and filthy he
may feel himself to be; whatever the weight of sin that lies upon
his conscience, nothing—nothing, no, nothing can wash out this
anointing if God has been pleased to favour him with it. This is
our meetness for heaven, for what the Lord does he does for
ever; and his gifts and calling are without repentance. This is the
saint's richest mercy that what the Holy Spirit has communicated
can never be effaced or blotted out. If sin could do it, would not
sin have done it long ago? If temptation could do it, would not
temptation long since have succeeded in drying up, like a wind
from the desert, every trace of it? If Satan could do it, would he
not long ago have triumphed with hellish glee over defacing the
workmanship of God? But this is the blessedness and this the
security of the saints of God, that the anointing which they
receive from the Holy One abideth in them uneffaced and
ineffaceable.

III.—Now, to come to our last point, on which, as I have already

somewhat trespassed upon your attention, I must be brief—the
spirit and effect of this anointing: "Even as it hath taught you, ye
shall abide in him." The Apostle speaks here of two things—what
this anointing has done, and what it will continue to do.

What has it already done? What are its past fruits and effects?
Two, chiefly. To give union, and to maintain union with the Son of
God. "Our fellowship," John tells us, "is truly with the Father and
with his Son Jesus Christ." (1 John 1:3.) But whence came this
fellowship? From the anointing; for "he that is joined to the Lord
is one spirit"—so that the anointing gives union with Christ. As
then it gives union with Christ, so it also produces communion;
and as this union and communion abide by virtue of the abiding
of the anointing, it enables the soul to abide in him—never to
leave him, as he never will leave it, and never forsake him, as he
will never forsake it. But thus to abide in him is the fruit of his
abiding in us. "Abide in me and I in you." "He that abideth in me
and I in him, the same bringeth forth much fruit." But how do we
abide in him? By his Spirit and grace; and how does he abide in
us? By his presence and his word, both of which are by virtue of
the anointing of the Spirit. O what a divine reality there is in
these things! May we not say of them, as of the blessed Lord
himself, that they are "all our salvation and all our desire?"

But, now to keep you no longer, let me ask you in all simplicity
and sincerity, what you know of this anointing? Can you feel, as it
were, as if holy John were himself personally addressing you and
saying to you, "Ye have an unction from the Holy One, and ye
know all things;" "the anointing which ye have received of him
abideth in you?" Have you ever had a solitary drop of this holy
anointing oil fall upon your heart? One drop, if it be but a drop,
will sanctify you for ever to the service of God. There was not
much of the holy anointing oil used for the service of the
tabernacle, when we consider the size and quantity of what had
to be consecrated; for Moses had to anoint therewith the whole of
the tabernacle of the congregation, as well as all the vessels, with
all their various appurtences. When he went through the sacred
work, he touched one vessel after another with a drop of oil; for
one drop sanctified the vessel to the service of the tabernacle.
There was no repetition of the consecration wanted; it abode. So
if you ever had a drop of God's love shed abroad in your heart; a
drop of the anointing to teach you the truth as it is in Jesus; a
drop to penetrate, to soften, to heal, to feed, and give light, life,
and power to your soul; you have the unction from the Holy One;
you know all things which are for your salvation; and by that
same holy oil you have been sanctified and made meet for an
eternal inheritance. Examine these heavenly mysteries: look to
them well, and see whether you can bless God for having
bestowed one drop of this holy anointing oil upon your soul.
An Anxious Inquiry and a Gracious Response

Preached at North Street Chapel, Stamford, on Lord's Day

Morning, Jan. 20, 1861

"Tell me, O thou whom my soul loveth, where thou feedest,

where thou makest thy flock to rest at noon: for why should I be
as one that turneth aside by the flocks of thy companions? If thou
know not, O thou fairest among women, go thy way forth by the
footsteps of the flock, and feed thy kids beside the shepherds'
tents." Song of Solomon 1:7, 8

It is very beautiful, and not less profitable than beautiful, to

observe the variety of ways in which it has pleased the God of all
grace to reveal his mind and will to the sons of men in the
scriptures of truth. Look a little closely at your Bible from this
particular point of view. What a wonderful book it is! and not less
wonderful for its contents, and the glorious truths which shine
and sparkle as with divine lustre in every page, than for the
amazing variety in which those contents are unfolded to our
enlightened understanding, and those glorious truths held up to
our spiritual view. This variety is not a matter of accident, or of
human contrivance, but a fruit of heavenly grace, originated by
divine wisdom, and designed for a special purpose, that God
might instruct us more clearly into his mind and will. Let me,
then, devote a few minutes to the illustration of this peculiar
feature of the Scriptures, as I love to point out the wisdom and
grace of God in the revelation of himself in the word of truth.

1. God instructs us, then, sometimes by history or sacred

narrative; as we find it employed in the historical books of the
Old Testament, and in the Gospels and Acts of the Apostles in the
New. What should we have known of the creation and fall of man;
of the destruction of the old world by the deluge; of the
preservation of Noah and his family in the ark; of the call of
Abraham; of the raising up and maintenance of a peculiar people
in the children of Israel from generation to generation, that from
the tribe of Judah and the loins of David, as concerning the flesh,
the promised Messiah should come into the world, except for the
historical books of the Old Testament? Again, but for the Gospels,
what should we have known, at least fully and clearly, of the holy
conception, the lowly birth, the suffering life, the agonizing death,
the glorious resurrection and ascension of the Lord Jesus Christ?
Where but for the Gospels would have been our knowledge of the
surpassing miracles, the instructive parables, the precious
discourses, the garden woes, the bloody sweat, the sacrifice and
sufferings of our most gracious Lord? And but for the Acts of the
Apostles, what should we have known of the pouring out of the
Holy Ghost and the promulgation of the Gospel at Jerusalem; of
the persecutions and sufferings of the Christian Churches in
various places, and of the blessings that rested upon the ministry
of the apostles?

2. But God has sometimes seen fit to vary his mode of

instruction, and to teach us by type and figure, as in the paschal
lamb, in the cloudy pillar, in the tabernacle and ark of the
covenant in the wilderness, in the brazen serpent, in the scape-
goat, and in the whole train generally of Levitical rites,
ceremonies, and sacrifices.

3. But as a further instance of this variety of instruction, let me

mention how God has been pleased also to teach us by prophecy,
as in the whole range of prophetical scripture, from Isaiah to
Malachi in the Old Testament, and the book of Revelation in the
New. He has thus afforded us predictions of countless events,
either already accomplished, as those referring to the first coming
of Messiah, or yet to be fulfilled, as in his second coming; and has
thereby given us the strongest attestation to the truth and
inspiration of his holy word.

4. Sometimes he has taught us by metrical compositions of men

of God in days of old, when they poured out their complaints or
recorded their joy in "psalms, and hymns, and spiritual songs"—
as, for instance, the songs of Miriam, Moses, and Hannah, and
especially that blessed treasure-house of Christian experience,
the Book of Psalms.
5. Sometimes he has seen good to teach us by proverbs,
apophthegms, and short sentences, in which he has been pleased
to couch vast depths of moral and spiritual instruction—as in the
Proverbs and Ecclesiastes.

6. Sometimes he has seen fit to instruct us by letters, as in the

Epistles of the New Testament, wherein we have the grand truths
of our most holy faith so blessedly set forth, and the top stone, as
it were, put on of divine precept and godly practice to crown the
edifice of doctrine and experience.

7. And in one instance, he has seen fit to instruct us by a Song—a

holy song—called "the Song of Songs," or "the Song of Solomon,"
but which, from its general arrangement and character, we
would, in all godly reverence, rather term a holy drama, or sacred
pastoral; for in it we find a kind of dramatic picture or scenic
representation of the mutual love and sacred communion of
Christ and his Church under the figure of a Bridegroom and Bride,
enjoying, in various scenes and places, each other's delightful
company.

From this part of Holy Scripture, then, this vivid and picturesque
representation of heavenly love, I shall endeavour, with God's
help and blessing, to speak in your ears this morning, taking for
my text the words which I have already read.

In those words you will find two speakers—one the Bride

addressing the Bridegroom in the language of inquiry, and the
other the Bridegroom answering her question. This simple
division then of Question and Answer will form the two leading
branches of my subject.

I.—First, then, we have the Anxious Inquiry of the Bride, who

desires to know where the Bridegroom's flock would rest at noon;
for she could not bear the thought that she should be "as one
that turned aside by the flocks of his companions."
II.—Secondly, the Gracious Answer which fell from his lips, that if
she knew not the appointed place of rest and refreshment she
was to go her way forth "by the footsteps of the flock, and feed
her kids beside the shepherds' tents."

i. But before we address ourselves to the Anxious Inquiry of the

Bride as thus stated, it will be necessary to look a little at her
character; because though the Bride represents the Church of
God in the aggregate, yet as there is but "one body, and one
spirit" (Eph. 4:4), her sighs and songs, prayers and praises,
conflicts and conquests, sorrows and joys, are but the reflections
of, and intimately correspond with, the experience of every saint
of God. So she stands forth in the word of truth, and specially in
this sacred drama, not only as representing the whole of God's
family in the aggregate, but as foreshadowing the character and
experience of each child of God in the particular. You may
compare yourself then personally and individually with the
description which the Holy Ghost has given here of the Church of
God in her inmost experience. He has taken the veil from off her
face and heart that you may see the features of the one and
watch the pulsations of the other; and if, as in water, face
answereth to face, you can see your features in her features and
read your heart in her heart, you may so far, with God's help,
take some comfort or encouragement, as having scriptural
grounds to believe that you are a living member of the mystical
body of the Lord the Lamb.

1. Now one feature, and a very prominent feature of the Church

here is, her humiliation; the low place that she takes, and the
language of self-condemnation which she uses. She says, "Look
not upon me, because I am black, because the sun hath looked
upon me." (Song 1:6.) She had a view by divine teaching of her
thorough wreck and ruin in the Adam fall, and of the
consequences resulting therefrom through the power and effects
of temptation. In a woman, a clear, fair, fresh, soft complexion is
a special beauty and a most attractive charm. But she, in her own
eyes, was "black." Dark and swarthy was her skin, like that of an
African negress, burnt into her by the scorching sun which had
dried up all the tender juices of her once fair face and roseate
complexion. She could not bear to look at her own tanned and
tawny face, and therefore cried out, "Look not upon me, because
I am black. I am unworthy of the least glance of thy favourable
eye. The sun of temptation hath looked upon me, and meeting
the foul humours and gross corruptions of my face has blackened
my skin; I am not a fit bride for thee who "art fairer than the
children of men;" for how can black match with white? and I am
black." But to represent this feeling of her blackness more
strikingly, she compares herself to "the tents of Kedar," a place in
the wilderness of Edom, where the wandering shepherds dwelt in
tents made of camels' hair, and therefore black not only from the
original colour of the material, but additionally so by being
continually beaten upon by the rays of a burning sun and
begrimed by the smoke of the tent and the dust of the desert.
Such was she in her own eyes—"black" in her original colour as
woven throughout with sin in the Adam fall; "black," as warped
and scorched by the sun of temptation; "black," as begrimed with
the daily smoke of internal corruption; "black" as ever blown
upon by the dust of this ungodly world. Instead, therefore, of
viewing herself fair and comely, she rather beheld herself as did
Job, when he cried out, "Behold, I am vile;" as Isaiah, when he
said, "Woe is me! for I am undone;" and as Daniel, when his
comeliness was turned in him into corruption.

2. But with all this view of her own blackness, humbling her into
the very dust, she had a sight and some experimental knowledge
and enjoyment of her interest in Christ; she knew there was
something more and better in herself than blackness, for she
could add, "I am black, but comely"—yea, as comely "as the
curtains of Solomon." We read in this book of Solomon's bed, and
we have a description given of its guards: "Behold his bed, which
is Solomon's: three-score valiant men are about it, of the valiants
of Israel." But if we adopt the marginal reading of "bed" for
"chariot" in the following verse, which seems to be more suitable
to the context and to the description itself, we shall find a most
glowing and picturesque account of the ornaments and furniture
of this bed. "King Solomon made himself a bed of the wood of
Lebanon. He made the pillars thereof of silver, the bottom thereof
of gold, the covering of it of purple; the midst thereof being
paved with love for the daughters of Jerusalem." Is not that last
touch of the picture more suited to a bridal bed than to "a
chariot," or palanquin, as some explain the word? Now "the
curtains" of this bed must have been as beautiful as the four
pillars of silver at each corner, the bottom, or main support, of
gold, and the covering or coverlid, spread over the whole of
purple—the quilt of Tyrian dye, worn only by kings and princes.
As there was in those days a great intercourse between Judea
and India, Solomon's ships going from Tarshish to Ophir, there is
a great probability that these curtains were formed of the most
beautiful India muslin. They might even have been made of
shawls from the looms of Cashmere, those costly productions
which grace the very shoulders of queens and princesses.

But what a contrast to the tents of Kedar! Can you picture to your
eye first "the tents of Kedar," a low, black, dusty group of
shepherds' tents, nestling in the desert amidst the desert amidst
the bleating flocks—something like a gipsy camp! Such was the
Bride in herself. Now look into Solomon's palace and see the
curtains of his royal bed. How clean, how rich, how beautiful!
Such was the Bride in Christ.

3. But there are other features stamped upon her; and one of a
very marked character. I shall have occasion to dwell by and by
more fully upon this point; I shall therefore only just touch upon
this feature of her character. She had, then, great love for Jesus,
for she could say, "O thou whom my soul loveth." Her tongue
here expressed what her heart felt, for she could say that her
very soul loved him. Now if a man has no love whatever to Jesus,
he certainly has no right to think or call himself a Christian. Do I
stretch the cord too tightly when I say this? Is my test too
severe? Let me ask have you ever pondered over that solemn
word of Paul's? "If any man love not the Lord Jesus Christ, let
him be Anathema"—or accursed? Is my sword sharper than
Paul's, or my test more severe than his? If then a man professing
to know the truth for himself by some experience of its power has
never known anything of love to the Lord from some discovery of
his Person and work, grace and glory, well may I ask if he has
any well grounded testimony of his interest in a salvation so
great, and in a Saviour so blessed?

4. But besides this love, there was another feature stamped upon
her character to which I have already partially alluded—great
sincerity. She could appeal to him as one who knew her very
heart. "O thou whom my soul loveth." She felt as Peter felt, when
the Lord seemed in some measure, as Peter feared, to doubt his
love. Knowing his own sincerity, and conscious that the Lord
knew it too, he broke out, "Lord, thou knowest all things; thou
knowest that I love thee." So the Bride not only felt the warm
flame of love glowing in her breast, but was so sure it was there
that she could appeal to him that she was sincere in the
expression of it. It was therefore, not a love in word or in tongue,
but in deed and in truth; not a love of lip, but a love of heart—a
love which he himself had kindled in her breast, and given her to
know as his own gift and work, the fruit of his own grace.

5. But now look at another feature which beams forth from her
portrait under the lively handling of the blessed Spirit; she was
hungry, for she asked him to tell her where he fed his flock,
evidently showing that she was seeking heavenly food.

6. But she was weary also of sin and self, of the world and of
everything below the skies; and yet felt that there was rest in
Christ, for she asked him to tell her where "he made his flock to
rest at noon."

7. The last feature I shall now name is her holy jealousy and
godly fear over herself. She dreaded lest she should be led to
turn aside from the strait and narrow way, from her loyalty and
her love, and be beguiled in any measure to say or do anything
that seemed like a departure from her willing obedience to the
Lord of her heart and affections.

Now can you find any or all of these seven marks of grace in your
soul—that you are self-abased; that you have any testimony of
your interest in Christ; that you do love the Lord Jesus; that you
are sincere; that you are hungry and long for food; that you are
weary and seek for rest; and are jealous over yourself with a
godly jealousy, lest you depart from the right ways of the Lord?
The standard I have set up is not very high, but I believe it is
true and scriptural. If, then, you can find these seven marks in
your soul, wrought there by divine power, you have so far a
scriptural testimony that you are one whom the Bride here
represents, and will therefore be able to enter more fully and
clearly into her Inquiry, and the Lord's Answer.

ii. Let us look then now at her Inquiry: "Tell me," she says, "O
thou whom my soul loveth." You see how anxious she was to get
a word from the Lord. This also I might have named as a special
mark of a soul under divine teaching: its earnestness, its anxiety
to be taught of God, to get a testimony from the Lord's own
mouth, a witnessing word from the Lord's own lips. She could not
be satisfied with the testimony of man, or be content with such
instruction as she might gather from the lips of others. Nothing
short of the Lord himself speaking with power to her soul could
give her any solid satisfaction. Were you ever there? Do you
know what it is often upon your knees to be begging of the Lord
to speak to your soul with power? She then appeals to him why
he should thus speak to her? for it was with her a matter of very
anxious inquiry. She would not be deceived for all the world. She
knew that everything was at stake, and putting her soul, its
salvation and its sanctification into the balance, nothing could
induce her to depart from this point, that it must be the Lord, and
the Lord alone, who could satisfy her longing desires, by speaking
a word to her inmost heart. And observe the ground on which she
appeals to him. It is the ground of love. She would say, "I do not
come before thee as a stranger, as an enemy, as an alien, as one
who has no knowledge of thee, or of whom thou hast no
knowledge; but as one who loves thee—not in word, or tongue,
or profession, but in my very soul, from some communication of
thy love to my heart." Now can you go before the Lord on the
very same ground of love and affection to his dear name, and say
with her as sincerely, if not as warmly and as tenderly, "Tell me,
O thou whom my soul loveth?" Is your answer "Yes, I can." You
must have some ground for your answer. Love is easily talked
about, easily professed, and perhaps no one thing is more
counterfeited; but to talk about love is to love in word and in
tongue; the love that is wanted is in deed and in truth. Now what
forms the ground of love? for we do not love either naturally or
spiritually for nothing. If we fall in love, as it is called, there is
some ground for it, something attractive, amiable, winning,
loveable in the beloved Object. So before you can love the Lord,
you must have seen something in him to love him for. You must
have had, for instance, a view by faith of his eternal Deity and
Sonship, as the only begotten of the Father, full of grace and
truth. You must have had a view of his holy, suffering, and pure
humanity, and seen him in some measure as "a man of sorrows
and acquainted with grief," in Gethsemane's gloomy garden, or
on the agonising cross at Calvary; and you must have had also
some discovery to your faith of his complex Person as God-man,
Immanuel, God with us, at the right hand of the Father, in glory
and majesty. Now I do not say that the Old Testament saints had
as clear a discovery of the Person and work of the Redeemer as
those have who have lived since his appearance in the flesh; yet
Abraham rejoiced to see Christ's day, and saw it and was glad;
and Job knew that his Redeemer lived. So the Bride, speaking
under divine inspiration, and representing the Church of Christ,
had, no doubt, a view of the glorious Person of her Beloved, for
giving a description of him in this holy hook, she says, "My
beloved is white and ruddy, the chiefest among ten thousand."
She must then have had a view of his glorious Person and
surpassing beauty. Nor was she without some intimation of his
love, for she says, "Let him kiss me with the kisses of his mouth;
for his love is better than wine" (Song 1:2); and, after a glowing
description of his Person, adds, "his mouth is most sweet: yea, he
is altogether lovely. This is my beloved, and this is my friend, O
daughters of Jerusalem." (Song 5:16.) We cannot doubt, then,
that the Bride, as representing the church, loved the Bridegroom,
not from hearsay description, but from a gracious discovery of his
heavenly beauty.
But besides this attractiveness in the Object, winning the heart
and affections, there must be some intimation from his own lips
that he loves us as well as that we love him. How tormenting is
unrequited love, as many a poor love-stricken maiden has felt
and known even to death. How galling, how mortifying to man or
woman to love and not to be loved again. But spiritual love is
never unrequited love. No Christian heart need bleed or break
under the pangs of love being only on one side. This the Scripture
has decisively settled. "We love him because he first loved us." "I
have loved thee with an everlasting love; therefore, with loving
kindness have I drawn thee." A child of God may fear, as many
have feared, that the Lord does not love him; but there is no real
ground for this fear; for our love to the Lord, if indeed we do love
him, is but a faint and dim reflection of his love to us.

iii. This love, then, in the Bride's heart moved and influenced her
to put up this anxious inquiry, "Tell me," she says, "where thou
feedest." She was hungry, for she was one of those whom the
Lord himself pronounces blessed, as "hungering and thirsting
after righteousness;" and under the pressure of this hunger she
needed food. The Lord Jesus Christ is set forth in the word of
truth as "the good shepherd." "The Lord is my shepherd," says
David, "I shall not want." But a main office of the shepherd is to
feed the flock: as in the psalm to which I have already referred,
David says, "He maketh me to lie down in green pastures." And
thus speaks the prophet, "He shall feed his flock like a shepherd."
(Isai. 40:11.) So in Ezekiel the Lord himself promises, "I will feed
my flock, and I will cause them to lie down, saith the Lord God."
(Ezek. 34:15.) Thus viewing the Lord in the character of a
shepherd, the bride here says, "Tell me, O thou whom my soul
loveth, where thou feedest thy flock." It is, therefore, almost as if
she said, "Lord, I am hungry; I want some food for my soul; I am
starving, sinking, fainting, for want of food; I am dying for
something which thou alone canst give. O tell me with thy own
lips where it is thou feedest thy flock, that I may go where they
are, and get some of the pasture which thou givest them." Does
your soul ever want to be thus fed? Have you come up here this
morning with any appetite? Do you hunger for a word from the
Lord to be spoken to your heart? Are you in search of Gospel
food? Are you come here this morning, saying in substance if not
in word, "Tell me, O thou whom my soul loveth, where thou
feedest, that I may have some food given to me by thyself?"

iv. But if the Lord feed them, he must have something to feed
them with, and that suitable to the hunger of the soul. What does
he feed them with? With various kinds of food; but all alike
nourishing and satisfying to the soul—for the food he gives is not
less than himself.

1. Sometimes, then, he feeds the soul with his presence. This fills
up the aching void; this relieves the hunger; this satisfies the
want; for to feed upon his presence is to feed upon himself.
2. But he feeds them also with his promises; for he has filled the
word of truth with them as so much choice provender for his
flock. There is not a state or case, trial or temptation, difficulty or
perplexity, grief or affliction, ache of heart or pain of mind,
burden of spirit or guilt of conscience, heavy bereavement or sore
disappointment, for which there is not some suitable promise in
the word of his grace. As, then, these promises are laid before
the sheep by the good Shepherd as their choice and suitable
food, and they are enabled by his grace to feed upon them, their
souls are sensibly nourished and strengthened. This is fulfilling
the word of promise; "I will feed them in a good pasture, and
upon the high mountains of Israel shall their fold be: there shall
they lie in a good fold, and in a fat pasture shall they feed upon
the mountains of Israel." (Ezek. 34:14.)

3. But he feeds them more especially with his own flesh and his
own blood, for he says, "My flesh is meat indeed, and my blood is
drink indeed;" and again, "He that eateth me, even he shall live
by me." (John 6:55, 57.) When, then, the blessed Lord is pleased
to discover to the soul a sense of his dying love, what he is as a
suffering Jesus, in bearing our sins in his own body on the tree,
and applies this love and blood to the conscience, then there is a
feeding by faith upon his flesh and drinking by faith of his blood.
This is "meat indeed and drink indeed," for eternal life is in it; as
the Lord himself declared, "Whoso eateth my flesh, and drinketh
my blood, hath eternal life; and I will raise him up at the last day.
He that eateth my flesh, and drinketh my blood, dwelleth in me
and I in him." (John 6:54, 56.) To be thus blessed and favoured
is to be fed with the choicest provision of God's house and be
sealed for heaven; for "he that eateth of this bread shall live for
ever." (John 6:58.)

v. But the bride wanted not only food; she wanted also rest. As
hunger made her long for food, so weariness made her long for
rest. Are you never weary of the world, weary of sin, weary of
self, weary of every thing below the skies? If so, you want
something to give you rest. You look to self; it is but a shifting
sand, tossed here and there with the restless tide, and ever
casting up mire and dirt. No holding ground; no anchorage; no
rest there. You look to others; you see what man is, even the
very best of men in their best state, how fickle, how unstable,
how changing and changeable; how weak even when willing to
help; how more likely to add to, than relieve your distress; if
desirous to sympathise with and comfort you in trouble and
sorrow, how short his arm to help, how unsatisfactory his aid to
relieve! You find no rest there. You lean upon the world: it is but
a broken reed which runs into your hand and pierces you. So look
where you will, there is no rest for the sole of your foot. But there
is a rest; for the sacred word of truth declares, "There remaineth
therefore a rest to the people of God" (Heb. 4:9); and our
blessed Lord says, "Come unto me, all ye that labour and are
heavy laden, and I will give you rest." (Matt. 11:28.) This rest is
Christ, and especially Christ in his finished work, as the apostle
declares, "We which have believed do enter into rest" (Heb. 4:3);
and this by ceasing from our own works and resting on Christ's,
according to the words, "For he that is entered into his rest, he
also hath ceased from his own works, as God did from his." (Heb.
4:10.) Now when you can fully rest upon the finished work of the
Son of God, and believe by a living faith that your sins were laid
upon his head; that he bore them in his body on the tree; that he
has washed you in his precious blood, clothed you with his
righteousness, and is sanctifying you by his Spirit and grace, then
you can rest. There is something here firm and solid for the
conscience to rest on. Whilst the law thunders, whilst Satan
accuses, whilst conscience condemns, there is no rest. But you
can rest where God rests. God rests in his love; in the finished
work of his dear Son; in the perfection of Christ's humanity; in
his fulfilment of all his covenant engagements; in the glorification
of his holy Law; in the satisfaction rendered to his justice; in the
harmonising of all his attributes; in the revelation of his grace
and his glory to the children of men; for he is his beloved Son, in
whom he is well pleased. The tabernacle in the wilderness, and
afterwards the temple on Mount Zion, was a type of the pure and
sacred humanity of the Lord Jesus. There God rested in a visible
manner by a cloud upon the mercy seat, called by the Jewish
writers, the Shekinah. This, therefore, was the place of his rest,
as he speaks, "For the Lord hath chosen Zion; he hath desired it
for his habitation. This is my rest for ever: here will I dwell; for I
have desired it." (Psalm 132:13, 14.) As, then, the Shekinah or
presence of God rested upon the ark; and as the glory of God in
the cloudy pillar rested upon the tabernacle, so the glory of God
rests upon the Lord Jesus Christ; and when you can rest where
God rests, then you enter into rest, and cease from your own
works, as God ceased from his. This is a glorious rest, for we
read, "To it shall the Gentiles seek: and his rest shall be glorious"
(Isai. 11:10); and "A glorious high throne from the beginning is
the place of our sanctuary." (Jer. 17:12.) "The Lord giveth grace
and glory" (Psal. 84:11); and this glory he gives his people when
they believe on the Son of God unto eternal life, as he himself
said, "And the glory which thou gavest me I have given them."
(John 17:22.) Have you not often toiled and laboured to establish
your own righteousness? And what was the end of all your
labours, the fruit of all your toils? Bondage, guilt, fear; weariness,
dissatisfaction, disappointment. And have you not sought
sometimes to get a little pleasure from the things of time and
sense, a little ease, a little rest, as a sick man tries a new remedy
or the weary invalid a fresh posture? But no remedy for the sick
man; no rest for the weary woman. So no change of place or
pursuit, no poppy of the field or drug of the laboratory could give
you the rest and peace that you needed. Nor will you ever find it
but in the Son of God.

But the Bride in the text was not, at that time at least, enjoying
this rest, or why need she utter the anxious inquiry, "Tell me
where thou makest thy flock to rest at noon." In those countries,
the noon is not, as in this, the most beautiful part of the day,
when, even in summer, if it is not too hot, we are glad to go
abroad into the open air. In those fervid times the noon-day sun
is something terrible to man and beast. All retreat to shelter, for
those fervent rays beat with such terrible power that men
sometimes drop down dead by what is called sun-stroke, or are
seized with brain-fever. The shepherds, therefore, when the
noon-day heat is about to make their flocks languish and hang
out their tongues with thirst and weariness, lead them under
some cool rock or the thick boughs of some umbrageous tree,
like the Banyan fig tree of India, where they find shade from the
heat, and can crop their food at ease. So when the burning sun of
temptation blazes in the sky; when the noon-day heat of the
assaults of Satan, or the hot rays of personal trouble and
affliction beat upon the defenceless head of the sheep of Christ so
as to make it faint, weary, and languishing, it longs for rest and
shelter. "Tell me," says the bride, "where thou makest thy flock
to rest at noon." She knew there was a place where the flock of
Christ rested at noon; and where he himself made them rest. But
this place she could not find without his guidance, or obtain rest
when found unless he himself gave it. She does not say, "Tell me
where the flock rests," but "where thou makest it to rest;" for the
Lord must not only provide the green pasture and the still waters,
but himself make the soul lie down in them and feed beside
them. How often you have had food spread before you, and could
not eat; had the bed made, and could not sleep in it!

vi. But there is another feature in her character which as I have

before pointed out, seems very marked—her godly jealousy over
herself. "For why," she says to her most blessed Lord, "for why
should I be as one that turneth aside by the flocks of thy
companions?" There is a little difficulty here, I am free to confess
it, in understanding whom these "companions" represent. If we
understand these "companions" to be the same persons as are
spoken of in the last chapter, "Thou that dwellest in the gardens,
the companions hearken to thy voice" (8:13)—they would seem
to represent those who were favoured with holy intimacy and
companionship with the Lord Jesus Christ; and as they had flocks,
they would shadow forth the under shepherds—pastors of
churches, ministers of truth, whom the great Shepherd had set
over various parts of the fold below, that they might feed them
with food convenient for them. If this be the correct
interpretation, the question might arise how she could turn from
the Lord if she associated with the flocks of his companions, for
when with them she would seem to be in her right place. Surely
we can hardly be wrong or be turning aside from the Lord if we
are walking in fellowship with those who are themselves walking
in close fellowship with Christ. Does not John say, "But if we walk
in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship one with
another, and the blood of Jesus Christ his Son cleanseth us from
all sin?" (1 John 1:7.) According to this testimony, then, to have
fellowship with the saints of God is closely connected with walking
in the light of God's countenance and enjoying the application of
atoning blood to cleanse from all sin. If, then, we interpret "the
companions" as the companions of Christ—the friends of the
bridegroom who, according to the Jewish custom, attended him
at the marriage feast (Judges 14:11; John 3:29), we must make
a little pause or inversion of the words, and read it thus: "Why
should I, by the flocks of thy companions, be as one that turneth
aside?" As though she said, "Why should I, with all my privileges
as being amongst the flocks of thy companions, favoured with
church ordinances and church fellowship, continually hearing the
servants of thine own sending, and walking in sweet union with
the people of thine own choosing,—why should I, so highly
favoured, be as one that turneth aside?" This interpretation, if we
adopt it, would bear a good gospel sense, for there is a tendency,
even amongst God's children to rest upon privileges, to build
upon ordinances, and to think because they are favoured with
sitting under a gospel ministry, or belong to a gospel church, that
all is well between God and their soul, when there may be a great
deal of secret turning aside from the Lord in their heart and
affections. Your walk and conduct may be consistent; you may
keep up the strictest attention to what are called the duties of
religion; and yet with all this there maybe a great deal of inward
departing from the Lord. True spiritual fellowship with the Lord's
people, and especially with his "companions," or those who live
very near to him, I have already shown, is closely connected with
walking in the light of the Lord's countenance; but there may be
an associating with the Lord's people, and yet borrowing no light
from their lamp or getting heat from their warmth. The wise and
foolish virgins went out on the same errand and for the same
purpose. Even a believer may associate with the believing, and
not have the same activity of faith; and a lover of truth with the
loving, and not feel the same warmth of love. Taking that view of
her meaning, it is as if she said, "Why should I be as one who
drinks at the stream instead of drinking at the Fountain? whose
wicked heart turns aside from thee even amidst the flocks of thy
ministering servants—those "Happy men," those "happy
servants," who, like Solomon's, "stand continually before thee
and hear thy wisdom." (1 Kings 10:8.) "O how base must be my
heart to be contented without enjoying thy sweet presence,
resting upon some outward privileges, and going in and out
amongst thy people and thy servants, and yet be secretly
forsaking the Fountain of living waters and hewing out to myself
cisterns, broken cisterns, which hold no water." She saw the
snare, and cried to be delivered from it. In this expression of her
feelings, I see the godly jealousy which the Bride has over
herself. Many, I believe, rest upon their Christian privileges, their
Church membership, and their general reception as partakers of
grace by the people of God, without any deep searchings of heart
whether they are walking near the Lord in all holy obedience to
his will and word. But where the soul is sensitively alive to its own
spiritual condition, and especially when it has known something
formerly of sweet communion with the Lord of life and glory, it
sees the snare thus spread for its feet, and says, "Though I am
favoured with sitting under a sound gospel ministry; though I
have joined myself to the people of God, and have been cordially
received and am generally esteemed by them; though I statedly
meet with them, and often converse with them and the minister
on the things of God, yet I know and feel that I may have all
these privileges, and yet be a backslider in heart, a wanderer
from the Lord in my affections, and not enjoy his sweet presence
within, or have that sacred communion with him with which I
have been favoured in times past. O why should I, then, if
favoured with all these privileges, be as one that turneth aside
from him, so that instead of using them I rather abuse them, and
rest upon them instead of resting upon the Lord?"

That is one sense of the text, and affords in my judgment a

sound, scriptural, experimental meaning. But take another—that
these "companions" were not the real companions of Christ, but
such as professed to be; and that these flocks were not really
sheep of Christ, but only so in appearance, like those spoken of in
Ezekiel; "And as for you, O my flock, thus saith the Lord God;
Behold, I judge between cattle and cattle, between the rams and
the he goats." (Ezek. 34:17.) There the Lord declares he "will
judge between cattle and cattle"—implying that there are "cattle"
which are not his cattle; and "between the rams and the he
goats"—the strong and vigorous goats, as distinguished from his
own poor, weak, and sickly sheep. The "companions," then, who
shepherd these rams and he-goats would represent the letter
ministers who profess to preach the truth and to be companions
of Christ; but who have never learnt of him to be meek and lowly
in heart, and who have never felt the liberating, sanctifying
influence and power of the very truth which they preach. When,
then, a tender-hearted, humble, and simple child of God gets in
any way amongst these flocks of Christ's pretended companions,
and especially if he become secretly entangled with these letter
ministers and these letter churches, he feels there is a being
gradually drawn aside from the simplicity of the gospel. "Evil
communications corrupt good manners;" and a hardness of heart
and deadness or carelessness of spirit soon creep over him. As,
then, he begins to feel the working of this death-dealing poison,
godly jealousy is roused up as if from its drugged sheep, and
seeing the snare he trembles lest he should become a backslider
in heart, and be filled with his own ways. He becomes jealous
over his own heart, lest he be drawn aside from the Lord, and be
satisfied with a name to live. "O," he says, "why should I be as
one that turneth aside by the flocks of these companions? The
minister starves my soul, and the people deaden my spirit. Their
conversation is of the earth earthy, and though they profess to be
flocks of Christ, what marks of sheep do I see in them? I feel I
am turning aside from my most blessed Lord. Why should I
depart from him, the source of all my life and love, to be
entangled with the flocks of his professing yet false companions;
perhaps be deceived in my profession of religion, and following
their bad and corrupting example, be righteously left to take up
with the form instead of the power, and substitute the letter of
truth for the sweet experience of it in the heart?"

II.—But as time is running on, which stops for no man, we must

pass on to the second leading point which I proposed to bring
before you—the Bridegroom's gracious Answer to the Bride's
anxious Inquiry: "If thou know not, O thou fairest among women,
go thy way forth by the footsteps of the flock, and feed thy kids
beside the shepherds' tents." (Song 1:8.)

i. Observe first in this gracious and wise Answer, the kind and
tender language in which he addresses her. She had called
herself "black;" but he will not have it so. He will not admit her
description of herself, or sanction it as applicable to her. "No," he
says, "thou art not black in my eyes, if black in thine own, but art
the fairest among women." What sweet humility on her part;
what gracious condescension on his! Not only was she fair—"thou
art all fair, my love;" but she was the fairest of the fair—the very
paragon of her sex. But what made her so fair in his eyes, though
so black in her own? Several considerations.

1. First, he viewed her as she was originally presented to his

acceptance in the councils of eternity before the foundation of the
world, as a spotless, unfallen bride. All the saints and servants of
God do not see exactly with me in this point; but my own view
and belief is, that the Church was espoused to Christ not as a
fallen, but as an unfallen Bride; and that as the High Priest, under
the law, was not allowed to take any but a pure virgin to wife, so
the blessed Lord, as the great High Priest over the house of God,
espoused to himself a virgin Bride; in other words, that the
Church was presented to him, as God afterwards presented Eve
to Adam, in all her unfallen purity and innocency. As such he
viewed her; as such he loved her; as such he wedded her. Thus,
as Milton says of our first mother,

"The fairest of her daughters, Eve,"

so was the Church in her unfallen condition, "the fairest among

women." As such he took her into union with himself, and as such
she was blessed in him with all spiritual blessings.

2. But she is "the fairest of women" in another sense. He viewed

her as washed in his atoning blood, clothed in his glorious
righteousness as her wedding garment, and sanctified and
cleansed by the washing of regenerating grace, as the apostle
speaks, "And such were some of you: but ye are washed, but ye
are sanctified, but ye are justified in the name of the Lord Jesus,
and by the Spirit of our God" (1 Cor. 6:11); and again,
"Husbands, love your wives, even as Christ also loved the
Church, and gave himself for it; that he might present it to
Himself a glorious church, not having spot, or wrinkle, or any
such thing; but that it should be holy and without blemish" (Eph.
5:25-27.)

3. But take another view of the words. Looking at her as she one
day will be in heaven perfectly conformed to his own glorious
image—"fashioned," as the apostle speaks, "like unto his glorious
body" (Phil. 4:21), comely in his comeliness, and glorified with
his glory, a fitting bride for the Lord the Lamb; looking beyond
the narrow isthmus of time into the mighty continent of a vast
eternity, he could even in a time state address her, "O thou
fairest among women."

ii. But though He so calls her, he yet gives her a gentle reproof:
"If thou know not"—as though he should say, "How comes it to
pass, that after all my teaching, all my instructions, thou art still
so ignorant?" "If thou know not"—surely thou oughtest by this
time to know. Yet with this not unmerited yet gentle reproof, he
still condescends to answer her Inquiry; as if he would say, If
thou art so ignorant, as thou art not wilfully ignorant, but art
willing to learn of me, "I will tell thee; I will not leave thee in
thine ignorance; I will teach thee."

iii. This brings us to the instructions he gives, and they are two,
by attending to which she would attain the object of her desires.
She had sought for food; she longed for rest; and she would
make any sacrifice to obtain them. Well knowing this, he gives
her two lessons of instruction.

1. The first is, "Go thy way forth by the footsteps of the flock." He
showed her by these words that she was still a good deal
entangled in things and circumstances out of which she must fully
and fairly come. There was a measure of the spirit of the world in
her which had to be purged out; she still had too much reliance
upon self, and cleaved too closely to her own wisdom, strength,
and righteousness: all these things were so many bonds and
hindrances, clogs and fetters, which kept her back from walking
in the narrow path. Her want of full separation from the world
and things worldly brought a veil over her eyes, and obscured the
road from her view. He says, therefore, "Go thy way forth." Here
is the wilderness before thine eyes, for thee to tread, not a flesh-
pleasing world. Thou must go forth from the world, from sin, and
from self, if thou art to find where I feed and make my flock to
rest at noon. If thou art still leaning upon thine own strength,
trusting to thine own righteousness, thou wilt never find the
object of thy desire. Go forth; leave these things behind, and set
thy face toward the wilderness." Now this requires a strength not
her own, a power which the Lord himself alone can give.

But she was to take very great care as to the road which she
took; for the wilderness having no beaten tracks, she might lose
herself therein. He adds, therefore, "I will give thee a sure and
safe direction that thou mayest find the right way. Mind the
footsteps of the flock. Go thy way forth by them; walk closely in
them; depart not from them; they are the right, the only road to
come to the place where I feed and where I make my flock to
rest at noon." Of course this has a spiritual and experimental
meaning. What, then, spiritually viewed does it signify? It is as if
he said, "Look at the way in which the saints of old have ever
trodden, and mark the deep footprints which they have left in the
road. And observe this, that all these steps are forward, and not
one of them is backward; all toward the wilderness, and not one
toward the world; all toward Christ, and none toward sin; all
toward life, and none toward death. As you see how the flock
have walked before you, take care that you walk just in the same
stops. Their steps will guide you right; they will bring you to the
place of food and shelter."

But what are these footsteps of the flock? Tribulation is one; for
"through much tribulation we are to enter the kingdom." If, then,
we are to go forth by the footsteps of the flock, it will be the path
of tribulation. Sorrow of mind, affliction of body, distress of soul,
disappointments in providence, persecution from the profane or
professing world, with many other painful trials and temptations,
are the usual lot of the Lord's people. In this way, as the apostle
testifies (Heb. 11.), those ancient witnesses, of whom the world
was not worthy, walked of old. In this path of tribulation our
blessed Lord himself walked, for he was "a man of sorrows and
acquainted with grief;" and in this path of trial and suffering all
have walked since he appeared on earth and entered into his
glory. To be, then, out of the way of tribulation is to be out of the
way altogether. He says, therefore, "Go thy way forth from the
path of ease and worldly happiness; shun not the cross; endure
hardship; prepare thyself for trouble. See how the flocks have
gone on before; observe what deep marks they have left, and
how they have all trodden the same path of temptation and trial.
By walking thus stedfastly in their footprints, thou wilt reach the
quiet, secluded, and shady spot where I feed my flock, and where
I make them lie down at noon."

But again, these footsteps of the flock are footsteps of faith;

because it is only by faith that we can walk in the path of life; as
the apostle says, "We walk by faith not by sight;" and again, "As
ye have received Christ, so walk ye in him." By faith Enoch
walked with God; and so walked Abraham, Jacob, and Isaac,
Joseph, and David, and the prophets. They all lived a life of faith
and died a death of faith; for God's own testimony concerning
them is, "These all died in faith." (Heb. 11:13.) If, then, we wish
to get into their rest, to live as they lived, and to die as they died,
we must walk by faith as they walked before.

2. But he gives her another direction: "And feed thy kids beside
the shepherds' tents." These shepherds are the servants of God,
the ministers of Christ, whom he raises up by his Spirit and grace
to feed the flock of slaughter. These have their "tents," by which
is intended that they at present dwell in the body of an earthly
tabernacle, and are strangers and pilgrims on earth. The servants
of Christ, like the servants in the wilderness, do not inhabit fixed
mansions, splendid palaces, enduring cities, for "here we have no
abiding city," but mere tents in which to tarry for a night; for our
life is but a vapour: it is soon cut off and we fly away.

But these shepherds, so far as they are taught of God, give the
sheep the same food that the Lord gives, and spread for them the
same rest at noon that he provides. He says, therefore, "Feed thy
kids," the tender graces of thy soul, "beside the shepherds'
tents;" look to the shepherds and where they feed and tend their
flocks. Spiritually interpreted, Seek out and find a gospel
ministry; see where power attends the word; bring your soul
under a shepherd who can feed it and give it rest. Bring the kids
of your soul, the tender graces which want special nurture, and
let them feed beside the shepherds' tents. Seek every
opportunity of hearing the word faithfully and experimentally
preached: it may often be a feeding time to your soul, that your
faith may be strengthened, your hope increased, your love
nourished, and the work of grace confirmed in your heart.

But if you set no value upon a gospel ministry, have no desire to

hear the word, or anxious cry that the Lord would bless that word
to your soul, how are you fulfilling the Lord's direction? You say
you want food and rest, to know Christ for yourself, to enjoy his
presence and love. The Lord gives you two directions to attain to
the enjoyment of these two blessings; 1, to tread in the footsteps
of the flock, to walk in the way in which the saints of old have
walked, in the path of tribulation and faith; 2, if you are favoured
in any way to live within reach of the shepherds' tents, and have
the privilege of hearing the gospel preached in its purity and
power, to bring your kids in your arms beside the tent, and to put
them down to feed on the juicy herbage. And be assured that if
you come to the shepherds' tents with a prayerful spirit and a
hungry soul, begging of God to open your heart to receive the
word with power, and to crown it with his blessings, sooner or
later you will find food and rest. But these things go together. If
you want food, you will go where it is to be got; if you want rest,
you will go where it is to be obtained. You will get neither in the
world. But as you get food and rest besides the shepherds' tents,
you will find that it is really and truly Jesus himself who feeds,
and Jesus himself who makes you lie down and rest. The
shepherds are but servants. Christ is the Bridegroom and he
alone has the Bride. The shepherds' joy is to bring the sheep to
Christ that they may find food and rest in him. By this test you
may find who are the shepherds that feed them with gospel food,
with the blood and flesh of Christ, and with that provision which
he has laid up in Zion. And I may add, that as your heart receives
the joyful sound, and you feel the power of God's truth in your
soul, there will be a doing what Christ bid as well as enjoying
what Christ reveals.

Consider these things; lay them to heart; ponder over them; and
may the Lord the Spirit apply them with his own divine unction to
your soul, that you may see their truth, feel their reality, and
know their weight and importance by a blessed experience of
both in your own bosom.
THE APPEAL AND PRAYER OF A WAITING SOUL

Preached on Tuesday Evening, August 3rd, 1852, at Eden Street

Chapel, Hampstead Road

"And now, Lord, what wait I for? my hope is in Thee. Deliver me

from all my transgressions; make me not the reproach of the
foolish." Psalm 39:7, 8

This psalm was written under peculiar feelings, and whilst the
Psalmist was passing through a peculiar experience. This indeed
is the case with well nigh every psalm, though we cannot always
so distinctly trace out the experience as in the one before us. Let
none think that David could sit down at pleasure and throw off a
psalm. Before he could pen one of these divine compositions, he
must have been brought by the Spirit of God into a special
experience; special feelings being thus wrought in his soul by the
power of the Spirit, he must next have special words dictated by
the same almighty Teacher. And when he was under such solemn
impressions and such inspired feelings, and was taught such
inspired words, he sat down and poured forth those heavenly
strains which were first sung in the tabernacle, and then laid up
with the other scriptures to be perpetual breasts of consolation
for the exercised family of God. Nor let anyone think that he can
understand the meaning, or use the words of the psalm, except
as he is taught by the same Spirit and brought into the same
experience. If he have not the same key, he cannot turn the
wards of the lock.

By examining this psalm, we may, with God's blessing, gather

some of the peculiar feelings of the Psalmist when it gushed
warm from his heart and mouth.

1. It seems to me, then, that he was at this time stretched upon

a bed of sickness; for we find him dwelling much upon the
uncertainty and frailty of life. "O spare me," he says in the last
verse, as if the Lord were about to cut short his days, "that I may
recover strength before I go hence and be no more." Again:
"Lord, make me to know mine end, and the measure of my days,
what it is, that I may know how frail I am," or, as we read in the
margin, "what time I have here."

2. But besides the bodily affliction under which the Psalmist

seems to have been labouring, it appears as if the Lord was at
this time chastening him very heavily in soul, for he prays,
"Remove Thy stroke away from me; I am consumed by the blow
of Thy hand." He cries out here as one who was writhing under a
sense of God's displeasure.

3. But further, these strokes of God's chastening rod, and these

blows of His heavy hand, were laying bare the iniquity of his
heart; for he says, "When Thou with rebukes dost correct man for
iniquity, Thou makest his beauty to consume away like a moth;
surely every man is vanity."

4. Lying, then, in this way under the double stroke of God,

stricken in body, and smitten in conscience, he looks, so to
speak, out of his chamber window, and takes a survey of
mankind in general. Viewing with spiritual eyes their useless
cares and vain disquietudes, and yet seeing how by all these they
were kept from divine realities, from the true knowledge of God
and of themselves, he bursts forth, "Surely every man walketh in
a vain show; surely they are disquieted in vain: he heapeth up
riches, and knoweth not who shall gather them."

5. Put besides this, it would appear that his conscience was now
made exceedingly tender, so that he durst not speak lest sin
should be stirred. "I said, I will take heed to my ways, that I sin
not with my tongue; I will keep my mouth with a bridle while the
wicked is before me."

6. Coupled with this (not to enlarge further upon the point), we

see also a blessed submission to the will of God wrought in his
soul. "I was dumb, I opened not my mouth, because Thou didst
it."
Prostrate, then, in body and spirit under the afflicting hand of
God, and having these divine impressions wrought in his soul by
the blessed Spirit, he breathes forth the words of the text, "And
now, Lord, what wait I for? my hope is in Thee. Deliver me from
all my transgressions; make me not the reproach of the foolish."

Our text contains four distinct clauses, which I shall, as the Lord
may enable, attempt to open up one by one as they lie before
me.

I. One reason why I have been endeavouring this evening to give

a faint sketch of the Psalmist's experience whilst penning this
psalm, was to show that David was not always in this frame of
soul. He was brought into it by the Spirit of God working in and
by those peculiar circumstances with which he was surrounded.
He was not always able, nor are we always able, to say unto the
Lord, "What wait I for?" His soul was not always thus chastened,
always thus meek, always thus waiting upon God, always thus
able to appeal to Him with simplicity and godly sincerity. The fan
in God's chastening hand had first winnowed away the chaff and
dust of self out of his soul before he could come to Him with that
prostration of spirit, that brokenness and humility, and to crown
all, that beautiful simplicity, "Now, Lord, what wait I for?" We
may use the words; but that is a very different thing from
possessing the same child-like brokenness, the same godly
sincerity, the same filial tenderness, the same bowing down of
heart, in a word, the same heavenly frame of soul in which David
was when he thus earnestly appealed to God. Before we can use
the words as David used them, the Lord must take us by His own
hand and mould us into the same experience as the potter
moulds the clay. But if we are brought by the hand of God into
this simple, child-like, tender, penitential frame—and this is for
the most part only under the chastening, afflicting rod of the Most
High—it will be sweet and blessed to walk in David's track, use
David's words, and feel a measure of David's simplicity and godly
sincerity in our soul.
i. In examining these words, it may be as well to see first what
David did not wait for. This may somewhat clear the way to see
what he was waiting for. One thing seems pretty plain; he was
not waiting for any temporal, earthly advantages, or anxiously
expecting any measure of worldly happiness. Those carnal desires
and earthly longings which engage the hearts of thousands had
been, for the time at least, winnowed out of him by the breath of
God's displeasure. Doubtless he wished to live a little longer; he
clung to life, as all men, even God's children, do cling to it, till the
Lord is pleased to dissolve that last tie which binds them to earth.
"Spare me," he cries, "that I may recover my strength." But
though he clung to life, he did not wait for life. Eternal things had
such a firm place in his heart, and lay with such weight and
power on his conscience, that there was no room for earthly
wants, no, not for life itself.

But did he wait, under these circumstances, for wealth and

temporal prosperity? As he looked out of his sick room he saw "all
men walking in a vain show." Men, he saw, were generally
walking, not in the possession and enjoyment of what was
substantial and eternal, but only of what was shadowy and
delusive. He perceived, therefore, how "they were disquieted in
vain; heaping up riches, not knowing who should gather them."
Could he, then, be waiting for that about which he saw men were
disquieting themselves in vain? Longing after realities, could he
pant after shows?

Or was he breathing after human applause? Did he pine for the

perishing breath of dying worms? We may be sure, when he was
lying under the afflicting hand of God in body and soul, human
praise and human dispraise, whether his name were on the lips of
admiring thousands, or he sank into the grave unnoticed and
unknown, were to him matters of indifference. But not to enlarge
further, was there anything of a temporal nature that he was
waiting for? Nothing, absolutely nothing.

Now a man does not very easily nor very often come into this
spot. It needs some, I might say much, furnace work before a
man can really come into this experience. So closely, so firmly,
does nature cleave to us, that it is rarely thus put off; so pressing
are its desires, so importunate its wants, that its voice is rarely
thus so dumb.

ii. But having seen what David did not wait for, let us attempt to
gather what he did wait for.

1. First and foremost, we may lay down as an object of his

waiting heart, a clear manifestation of the love of God. I do not
mean to say that he had not enjoyed this before; but when the
Lord was correcting him for iniquity, rebuking him with His heavy
strokes, and consuming him as the moth consumes the garment,
all sensible realization of it was gone. The cloud upon the throne
hid the face of the Lord. It is indeed this only which can really
comfort and support the soul with death in prospect, eternity in
view, and the hand of God upon the troubled conscience. This
alone can give solid peace, and dispel those gloomy doubts and
fears which, like night birds, flap their dismal wings over the soul
as death seems to draw nigh. By this alone the sting of death is
removed, the mouth of hell is closed, and the gates of heaven are
opened. Well then might he say, "Lord, what wait I for?" The
manifestation of Thy pardoning love to my heart.

2. But was there anything else besides that he waited for? David
at this time was lying under the rebukes of God; the chastening
hand of the Lord's displeasure lay heavy upon him. "Remove," he
cries, "Thy stroke away from me; I am consumed by the blow of
Thine hand." He was therefore waiting for the removal of the
chastening hand of God; or, if the Lord still continued to chastise,
to be enabled to feel that the rod was dipped in love. Languishing
in body, troubled in mind, with a load of guilt on his conscience,
well might he plead that these strokes might cease, or that he
might be able to regard them as fatherly chastisements, which
were working together for his spiritual good.

3. But was he waiting for nothing else? He was waiting also to

have his sins subdued, his powerful lusts and corruptions
overcome by the grace of God, that they might no longer, as they
had been accustomed, tease and distress his soul. The
corrections he was receiving for iniquity would necessarily make
him desire the subduing of iniquity; for unless subdued, a
repetition of sin would draw down a repetition of chastisement.

4. But was he waiting for nothing else? O yes; he was waiting for
a word to be spoken to his soul. We cannot read the 119th Psalm
without seeing David's intense love for and desire after God's
word. It was to him sweeter than honey and the honeycomb, his
daily delight, and his nightly meditation: "The entrance of Thy
word giveth light." "I opened my mind and panted, for I longed
for Thy commandments."

5. But was he waiting for nothing else? Yes; he was waiting for a
smile from God's gracious countenance; to behold all the clouds
that shrouded His face from view dispersed, and to see the
beams of the Sun of Righteousness break forth from behind those
clouds and shine with brightness into his soul. The frowns under
which he was lying made him pant after a smile: "Lord, lift Thou
up the light of Thy countenance upon me."

6. But was he waiting for nothing more? Yes, he was waiting for
the will of God to be accomplished in his soul; for the Lord to
manifest His victorious power, to dethrone his idols, subdue his
creature affections, and take such complete possession of his
breast that there might be room there for God and God alone.
Inordinate affections had been alike his sin and sorrow. Lust after
women had drawn him into adultery and murder; and an idolised
son had well nigh cost him his life and his throne.

7. But was he waiting for anything else? Yes; for the mind of God
to be stamped upon his soul, that he might be cast into the
mould of the divine image, having no thoughts but the thoughts
of God, no desires but the desires of God, and no will but the will
of God. To be teachable, patient, submissive, humble, child-like,
tender, obedient, watchful, prayerful, spiritually-minded; to have
the power of vital godliness brought into the heart, dwell on the
lips, and be made manifest in the life; to be purged from
hypocrisy, pharisaism, covetousness, pride, and worldly-
mindedness; to speak, act, and walk in the fear, faith, and love of
God; to live a believer's life, and die a believer's death, and then
exchange earth for heaven, and sin and sorrow for perfect
holiness and endless bliss—O what a store of such and similar
spiritual desires are crowded in the words, "Lord, what wait I
for?"

But the very words themselves clearly imply that he had no

power to produce these heavenly realities in his own soul. He
groaned out his desires after them, supplicating God that He
would bestow them upon him; and yet he was utterly unable to
bring the least portion of them into his heart. But he knew that
God, according to His revealed will, must be waited upon,
inquired of, supplicated unto; and he knew also that, for the most
part, He delayed His answers until He saw that the soul was in a
fit state to receive them.

But what kept him waiting? for we need to be kept waiting as well
as to be put, in the first instance, in a waiting position. What kept
him close to the footstool, made him persevere, and wrought this
feeling in his heart, that he would take no denial? What fixed him
to the throne, in spite of all opposition and all obstacles, the
workings of invisible agency, Satan's suggestions, infidel doubts,
and the surmises and suspicions of his own evil heart? The
greatness of the blessing that God was able to bestow upon him.

All these things it was working together in his soul, which

wrought in him that experience which he poured forth in the
simple yet most expressive words, "And now, Lord, what wait I
for?"

The words are easy; anybody can make use of them; and the
more that men's consciences are hardened, the more freely do
they make use of them. They are used all over the kingdom, in all
the churches and chapels of the land. Catholic and Churchman,
Puseyite and Methodist, the Sunday school child and University
student, all take the words as freely and unconcernedly into their
mouths as they would so much water. But who can enter into
their solemn import? Who can come with the same child-like
simplicity, and appeal to a heart-searching God with the same
godly sincerity? Who can thus lay out his whole soul before God,
and prostrate his spirit before the footstool of Jehovah? Only he
in whom the blessed Spirit is working in the same manner as He
wrought in the soul of David. Only he can really say, "Now, Lord,
what wait I for?" It is indeed a blessed posture to be lying thus at
God's feet, and to be able to tell Him that we are only waiting for
Himself. Such a soul is indeed precious in God's sight, and such
an experience is indeed wrought by His own hand in the heart.

II. "My hope is in Thee." These words plainly show how

completely David had been stripped and emptied of all creature
sufficiency. He had ceased to hope in himself; and no man can
hope in God until he has ceased to hope in himself. But every
man will, nay, must hope in himself, till all creature hope has
been burned out of him in the furnace. David did not then hope in
his own righteousness. That had been held up before his eyes
with all its rags and tatters, moth-eaten, as he speaks, and
therefore dropping to pieces from its own rottenness. Nor had he
any hope in any resolutions he might make that matters would be
with him at some future time better than they were now. He must
have felt, doubtless, by painful experience, that all such
resolutions are but as the tow when it meets the flame. Nor could
he hope in any promises or vows he might make that he would
never again transgress, never again be entangled in evil, never
again rebel, never again murmur, never again doubt or fear. Nor
could he hope in anything of human manufacture or creature
production. As every man did but "walk in a vain show," realities,
soul-sustaining realities, were not to be expected from those who
were themselves not real personages, but mere walking actors in
a theatrical pageant. Thus he had no hope either in himself or
others. Nor could he hope in the bare naked letter of God's Word;
without the Spirit's application it fell short of his case. Nor could
he hope in the mere doctrines of grace; in the external sound,
without the internal testimony. Nor could he hope in Christ at a
distance, without any manifestation, union, or communion. When
I say David did not thus hope, I am assuming him as a pattern of
a believer in similar circumstances now; for his views of Christ
and the gospel were, from the very nature of the dispensation
under which he lived, less clear than I have laid down.

But what brought David, and what brings every child of God with
David, to have no hope in himself? The afflicting hand of God in
his soul, breaking all his dreams of earthly happiness, all his webs
of creature righteousness, all his confidence in man, all his hopes
from the past, all his expectations from the future. Like Noah's
dove, he could find no rest for the sole of his foot on the floating
carcases; he could only hope in God, for there was none else left
to hope in. This was the only spot on which the soul of his dove-
like heart could rest; fluttering backwards and forwards over the
wreck of a deluged world, no rest could he find till he alighted
upon the ark.

But, though so much dust and rubbish had been swept away, and
room thus made for a gospel hope, something was still wanting.
The removal of a false hope does not give a true one; the pulling
down of an old hovel does not build up a new house. Before,
therefore, David could confidently say, "My hope is in Thee," he
must have had some clear manifestation of Christ to his soul. We
cannot hope in an unknown God, nor in an unseen Saviour, nor in
an unfelt salvation; we can only hope in these divine realities as
they are revealed to the soul, and brought into the heart by the
power of God Himself. Hope, in Scripture, is compared to "an
anchor, sure and steadfast, and which entereth into that within
the veil." But of what use is an anchor whilst lying in the
dockyard? It must be brought into the ship, and united to it by a
strong cable; then, when the wind rises and the storm comes on,
it is let go from the bow into the sea, and, grasping with its
tenacious fluke the firm bottom, it holds the ship's head from off
the breakers. An anchor, with a cable, is salvation; without one,
an incumbrance. So a hope that brings salvation must be a hope
in union with God. A hope that stands in the naked letter, in the
bare promise, is an anchor in the dockyard, and not an anchor in
the bottom of the sea. We want union with God through Christ to
bring salvation into the heart. "I in them, and Thou in Me, that
they also may be one in Us." This union is personal, vital,
spiritual, experimental, eternal." I am the vine, ye are the
branches." Now, when there is a manifestation to the soul of the
mercy, grace, and love of God in Immanuel, this produces a vital
union; and this is the entering of hope as an anchor "within the
veil." Then we ride at anchor; then we are safe amidst the
billows; and then we shall not concerning faith make shipwreck.

The words are simple, so simple that a child may use them. In
fact, as scarcely anyone is without some dim or distant hope in
God's mercy, it seems as if almost anybody might say unto God,
"My hope is in Thee;" but when we dive a little below the surface
of this outside religion, what a fund of Christian experience is
implied in the words! How the soul must have been brought to
see the fearful depth of the fall! How much must have been
pulled down, and how much built up! What a death must there
have been to self, and what life to God; what sights of sin, and
what views of grace, before a man can really take into his lips
these five monosyllables—in word, a sentence for an infant's
primer; in deed, the experience only of an exercised believer:
"My hope is in Thee!" People talk about hope, just as if it could be
picked up in the streets, or found at well-nigh every corner; but
this blessed grace of hope, this "anchor of the soul," is not so
easily got at. It is the result of the manifestation of God to the
heart, and therefore no man has any solid, well-grounded hope in
God, who has not ceased to hope in himself, and who has not
had, more or less, some manifestation of Christ.

III. But David adds, "Deliver me from all my transgressions." Sin

had been deeply opened up in his soul. Lying under the
chastening hand of God, writhing in body from pain, and in soul
from a sense of God's displeasure, he had had deep and solemn
views of the awful nature of sin. This forced from his heart and
lips the cry, "Deliver me from all my transgressions." Ah! how
rarely it is that we see sin in its true colours; that we feel what
the apostle calls, "the exceeding sinfulness of sin!" O how much is
the dreadful evil of sin for the most part veiled from our eyes!
Satan and a deceitful heart so gloss it over, so excuse, palliate,
and disguise it, that it is daily trifled, played, and dallied with, as
if this beautiful viper had no poison fang. "When the wine" of sin
"giveth its colour in the cup," how rarely is it remembered that,
"at the last it biteth like a serpent, and stingeth like an adder!" It
is only, then, as God the Spirit is pleased to open the eyes to see,
and awaken the conscience to feel "the exceeding sinfulness of
sin," and thus discover its dreadful character, that we have any
real sight or sense of its awful nature. But let a man lie, as David
lay, under the afflicting hand of God, smiting him with rebukes,
and making his "beauty to consume away like the moth," he will
soon cry out with him, "Deliver me from all my transgressions."
Sins of heart, sins of lip, sins of life, sins of omission, sins of
commission, ingratitude, unbelief, rebellion, lust, pride,
worldliness! as all these transgressions, troop after troop, come
in view; as our backslidings, inconsistencies, carelessness,
carnality, sins long buried and forgotten, but now rising up like
spectres from the grave, appear, well may we bury our head
beneath the bed-clothes, and cry with stifled voice, "Deliver me,"
O deliver me "from all my transgressions!"

Now, there are five things respecting sin from which every child
of God desires deliverance, and from which none but God can
deliver him.

1. There is, first, the guilt of sin, when sin is charged home upon
the conscience, and lies there as a heavy load! O the guilt of sin,
when God brings the soul to book, when He squares up matters,
when He holds out a long list of hideous transgressions, to bear
with weight and power upon the conscience! Then is felt the guilt
of sin; and David doubtless felt this when he said, "When Thou
with rebukes dost correct man for iniquity, Thou makest his
beauty to consume away like a moth." From this guilt of sin none
but God can deliver the conscience; and He delivers it only by the
application of the atoning blood of Jesus to the soul—that
precious blood which "cleanseth from all sin." Until, then, there is,
more or less, such a manifestation of this precious blood to the
conscience, the guilt of sin is not effectually taken away.

2. But then there is the filth of sin. O how it defiles the mind, the
memory, and the imagination! Like an uncovered sewer, you can
track its course by its smell and slime. This open sewer is a
defiled imagination. How loathsome and filthy does a poor sinner
feel "the earthly house of his tabernacle" to be, as this slimy ditch
oozes up through the chinks and cracks of the well-washed
boards, as I have read that a poor but clean country-woman
literally was pestered in one of the courts of Whitechapel. Sin,
horrid sin, defiles every word and work, every thought and
prayer. This makes the child of God cry out sometimes, in real
distress of mind, "Deliver me from all my transgressions." "O
deliver me from the filth of them! O wash me in the fountain once
opened for sin and uncleanness! renew me in the spirit of my
mind; purify and sanctify me by Thy grace."

3. But there is, thirdly, the dreadful love of sin which is so deeply
rooted in the carnal mind—that most accursed desire after and
delight in it. O that there should still dwell in the breast of one
who fears God lust and sensuality, and a whole host of
corruptions, better felt than described, better hinted at than
entered into! O that these should so lurk and work, and kindle
such desperate hankering desires after sin! How many sighs and
groans does this draw forth from the poor child of God! And yet,
after all his prayers and entreaties, convictions and sorrow for
sin, he will still find an accursed cleaving to it in his carnal mind.
And this makes him cry out, "Deliver me from all my
transgressions," and especially from that dreadful love of sin
which I feel so continually at work. But how is he delivered? By
the shedding abroad of the love of God in his soul; by the Holy
Spirit taking his affections and fixing them on things above, and
thus subduing, or casting out, the love of evil.

4. But closely connected with the love of sin is the power of sin;
for it is from the love of it that sin derives all its power. And who
can honestly say before God that sin, in some shape or other, is
never his master? Who can say with an honest countenance
before God, the Searcher of hearts, that pride, unbelief, evil
temper, covetousness, worldly-mindedness, and similar sins, in
these or other shapes and forms, have not sometimes had
dominion over him? This power of sin brings forth many a piteous
groan from the oppressed bosom of the child of God, and his cry
is for deliverance. Sometimes he receives this answer: "Sin shall
not have dominion over you, for ye are not under the law, but
under grace;" and as grace comes into the soul it subdues, while
it lasts, the dreadful dominion of evil.

5. The fifth and last dreadful feature of sin is its practical

commission. And who can say that he is altogether free here—
that he is never, more or less, guilty of the commission of sin, at
least in tongue, if not further? Who is free from hasty or idle
words? Who can always "keep his lips as with a bridle, while the
wicked is before him?" Who can say that all the day long his soul
is so kept in the fear of God, that he never speaks a word, or
does anything, that conscience testifies to be wrong? And if now
kept, who can look back through the vista of a long profession
and see nothing to be ashamed of? I know not the man—
wherever he lives, I cannot tell the road to find him; he certainly
does not live in my house.

These five things—the guilt, the filth, the love, the power, and the
practice or commission of sin, are surely enough, when felt, to
make the child of God grieve and groan, and exclaim in the
language of David, "Deliver me from all my transgressions." O
deliver me from the guilt of sin, the power of sin, the love of sin,
the filth of sin, and the practice of sin: "Deliver me from all my
transgressions" in every shape and form, here and hereafter, in
their cause and in their consequences, as offensive to God, as
wounding Christ in the garden and on the cross, and as grieving
and dishonouring the Holy Ghost.

IV. Now, closely connected with these breathings is the last

clause of the text: "Make me not the reproach of the foolish."
Why should David couple this petition with the preceding?
Because he knew what he was—his weakness and helplessness
under the power of temptation. He remembered the frailty of his
nature, and the evils of his heart; he was no novice in the school
of experience, but was deeply acquainted with the power of
temptation and the sin that dwelleth in us; he feared, therefore,
that in an unguarded moment he might be entangled in
temptation, and he knew that if then left of God he must fall; and
if he should fall, he knew that he would become "the reproach of
the foolish."

But who are these "foolish?" I think the best answer to this
question is given by our Lord Himself, in the parable of the wise
and foolish virgins. "The foolish" were those who had oil in their
lamps, but none in their vessels. By "the foolish" in the text,
therefore, we may understand those who have the light of
knowledge in their heads, and the lamp of profession in their
hands, but no oil of grace in their hearts. They are "foolish,"
because they know neither God nor themselves, neither sin nor
salvation, neither the depth of the fall nor the greatness of the
remedy. They are "foolish," as regards themselves, in thinking
that light and knowledge will save them, without life and grace;
and they are "foolish" as regards others, for want of an
experimental acquaintance with the heart. They know nothing,
therefore, of the temptations of a child of God; how he is beset
on every hand; how Satan is ever thrusting at or enticing him;
how his own heart is continually prompting him to evil; and how
snares are in every direction laid for his feet. The "foolish" know
nothing of these trials; they are Pharisees, who "make clean the
outside of the cup and platter," who whitewash and adorn the
sepulchre without, whilst within it is "full of dead men's bones
and all uncleanness." David knew well, and every child of God
knows well, that if he were allowed to slip, if he were suffered to
say or do anything unbecoming, these would be the very first to
make him an open reproach. "The foolish" can, and will, make no
allowance for the least slip of tongue or foot, for they themselves
are ignorant of the weakness of the flesh, the subtlety of Satan,
the strength of sin, and the power of temptation. Were he to
stumble and fall, "the foolish" would be sure to point the finger of
scorn at him. In breathing forth, then, this petition, we may well
suppose him to say: "Lord, whatever temptations I may be called
upon to endure, whatever snares of Satan or lusts of the flesh
may beset my path behind and before, O keep me, keep me, that
I may not be the reproach of the foolish; that they may have
nothing to take hold of, to make me a byword, and through me to
reproach Thy name, cause, and truth."

To become in this open way "the reproach of the foolish," is one

of the heaviest and most humbling strokes that can ever befall a
child of God. That these "foolish virgins," these empty professors,
who know nothing of God or themselves, should be able to point
the finger of scorn at him who has contended so loudly and so
long for the experimental possession of vital godliness, and spurt
out all their venom, saying, "Aha, aha! so would we have it!"—O
it is death! and indeed a man had better die at once than ever
thus become "the reproach of the foolish."

True religion is a very simple thing. Simplicity is stamped upon all

the works of God, and especially upon the work of grace. The
more genuine, therefore, our religion is, the more simple it will
be. To be simple is to be child-like, and to be child-like is to have
that mind and spirit without which no man can enter into the
kingdom of heaven. Can we, then, with this child-like simplicity,
walk step by step here with David, and follow him throughout?
Can we put our seal to these things, and say, "Lord, what wait I
for?" Is your religion brought into this narrow point? "Truly, my
soul waiteth upon God; from Him cometh my salvation." "My
soul, wait thou only upon God; for my expectation is from Him."
Such a frame of soul is indeed from the hand of God, for no man
ever did, or could bring himself into it. And if we can enter into
one part of these heavenly breathings, we shall be able also to
enter into the others, and say, "My hope is in Thee." Feeling the
weight and burden of sin, we shall be constrained to cry, "Deliver
me from all my transgressions;" and feeling our own weakness,
and the evil of our hearts, we shall add, "Make me not the
reproach of the foolish." If, then, we can sincerely, before God,
employ these petitions, may we not ask, Who produced them?
Who wrought this experience in the soul? From whose hands did
it come? Surely, surely, the same Lord that taught David must
have taught us; the same power that wrought in him must have
wrought in us—before we could, in sweet experience, enter into
this feeling language, and adopt it as our own. Here, therefore,
we see a little of what true religion is; here we see what are the
genuine breathings of a child-like spirit, and what is the
experience of a man of God; and it will be our mercy if we can
see in his experience a sweet counterpart of our own.
An Ascending Scale, or Steps of Thankful Praise

Preached at Providence Chapel, Oakham, on Lord's Day

Afternoon, June 13, 1865

"Who forgiveth all thine iniquities; who healeth all thy diseases;
who redeemeth thy life from destruction; who crowneth thee with
lovingkindness and tender mercies." Psalm 103: 3, 4

Whatever God does, whatever God has done, is for his own glory.
No other object, end, or aim can such a glorious Being as the
great self-existent I AM have than his own glory and its
manifestation to created intelligences. To this truth the Scriptures
bear abundant witness. When, for instance, they speak of
creation, their testimony is, "The heavens declare the glory of the
Lord, and the firmament showeth his handiwork." So witnesses
Psalm 8:1: "O Lord, our Lord, how excellent is thy name in all the
earth! who hast set thy glory above the heavens." In a similar
strain, in the Book of Revelation, a song of praise issues from the
four-and-twenty elders: "Thou art worthy, O Lord, to receive
glory and honour and power: for thou hast created all things, and
for thy pleasure they are and were created." (Rev. 4:11.) Nor is
the glory of God less his end and aim in Providence. Thus when
the Lord speaks in the Book of Numbers of his providential
dealings with the children of Israel, after he had given that grand
declaration, "As truly as I live all the earth shall be filled with the
glory of the Lord," he adds, "Because all those men which have
seen my glory, and my miracles, which I did in Egypt and in the
wilderness, and have tempted me now these ten times, and have
not hearkened to my voice, surely they shall not see the land
which I sware unto their fathers, neither shall any of them that
provoked me see it." The glory which they ought to have seen
was the glory of God in his providential dealings with Israel in
bringing them out of Egypt with a high hand and a stretched-out
arm, in providing for them food from heaven and water out of the
rock. (Numbers 14:21, 22.) Nay, the very reason of his
providential dealings with Pharaoh was to manifest his glory, as
the apostle quotes from the Book of Exodus: "For the Scripture
saith unto Pharaoh, Even for this same purpose have I raised
thee up, that I might show my power in thee, and that my name
might be declared throughout all the earth." (Rom. 9:17.)

But though the glory of God is thus plainly manifested in creation

and in providence, it is in redemption that it specially shines
forth. We find therefore that after the four living creatures and
four-and-twenty elders had fallen down before the Lamb, having
every one of them harps and golden vials (or rather as the word
means "bowls"), full of odours, which are the prayers of saints,
they sang a new song, saying, "Thou art worthy to take the book
and to open the seals thereof: for thou wast slain and hast
redeemed us to God by thy blood out of every kindred and
tongue and people and nation." Nor were the angels mute; for
though the number of them was ten thousand times ten thousand
and thousands of thousands, yet all these mighty myriads said
with a loud voice, "Worthy is the Lamb that was slain to receive
power and riches and wisdom and strength and honour and
blessing." Nor was creation itself silent, for we read, "And every
creature which is in heaven, and on the earth, and under the
earth, and such as are in the sea, and all that are in them, heard
I saying, Blessing, and honour, and glory, and power be unto him
that sitteth upon the throne, and unto the Lamb for ever and
ever." (Rev. 5:13.) Thus, whether it be in creation, in providence,
or in redemption, in all these domains of his wisdom and power,
the end and object of God have ever been to manifest his glory.
Nor let any one dare to think that this was, so to speak, a selfish
end. We must not measure God by ourselves, or ascribe anything
unworthy or unbecoming to him. He is so infinitely above all his
creatures that it would be unbecoming his glorious perfections to
have as his main object anything but his own glory. And yet it
was intended also for the happiness of those to whom his glory
should be manifested. God is essentially good; so good that
"there is none good but he." His name, his nature is love. To
reveal then this goodness, to manifest and make known this love,
was to create happiness for, and to fill with bliss and blessedness
thousands of millions of created intelligences, both angels and
men.

But besides the manifestation of his own personal glory, it always

was the eternal purpose of God to glorify his dear Son. He is, as
the Scripture testifies, "the brightness of his glory and the
express image of his Person." (Heb. 1:3.) God is essentially
invisible; for "he dwelleth in the light which no man can approach
unto, whom no man hath seen or can see." (1 Tim. 6:16.) And
yet it was his eternal purpose to make himself seen and known.
This is beautifully opened up by the apostle John: "No man hath
seen God at any time; the only begotten Son which is in the
bosom of the Father, he hath declared him." By "declared him," is
meant made him known, discovered, and revealed him. It is in
the face or Person of Jesus Christ that we see this glory of God,
as the apostle speaks: "For God, who commanded the light to
shine out of darkness, hath shined in our hearts, to give the light
of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ."
(2 Cor. 4:6.) Where God works by his Spirit there is a desire to
behold his glory. We find therefore Moses pleading earnestly with
the Lord, "I beseech thee, show me thy glory." But what was the
Lord's answer? "Thou canst not see my face, for there shall no
man see me and live." And yet he gave him his request: "And the
Lord said, Behold, there is a place by me, and thou shalt stand
upon a rock: and it shall come to pass, while my glory passeth
by, that I will put thee in a cleft of the rock, and will cover thee
with my hand, while I pass by: and I will take away mine hand,
and thou shalt see my back parts: but my face shall not be seen."
(Exodus 33:21, 22, 23.) Now of what was this cleft of the rock
typical? Was it not a type of the Lord Jesus?

"Rock of ages, cleft for me,

Let me hide myself in thee."

But what was the glory which the Lord displayed before the eyes
of Moses when he stood safely sheltered in the cleft of the rock?
"And the Lord passed by before him, and proclaimed, The Lord,
the Lord God, merciful and gracious, longsuffering and abundant
in goodness and truth, keeping mercy for thousands, forgiving
iniquity and transgression and sin, and that will by no means
clear the guilty." (Exodus 34:6, 7.) Thus we see that to be
merciful and gracious, longsuffering, and abundant in goodness
and truth, forgiving iniquity and transgression and sin, is the
glory of God in its manifestation. But what forgiveness is there of
sin except in his dear Son? as we read: "In whom we have
redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of sins, according
to the riches of his grace." (Eph. 1:7.)

Our blessed Lord glorified his Father by doing his will upon earth.
He therefore said, in his intercessory prayer, "I have glorified
thee on the earth: I have finished the work which thou gavest me
to do" (John 17:4); and as he glorified the Father so did the
Father glorify him, by supporting and sustaining him in the
garden and upon the cross, by accepting his sacrifice, raising him
from the dead, and setting him at his own right hand as the High
Priest over the house of God. For this he prayed, "And now, O
Father, glorify thou me with thine own self with the glory which I
had with thee before the world was;" and this prayer God
answered to the joy of his soul. Truly was that prayer then
fulfilled which the church offered for him in anticipation: "The
Lord hear thee in the day of trouble; the name of the God of
Jacob defend thee; send thee help from the sanctuary, and
strengthen thee out of Zion; remember all thy offerings, and
accept thy burnt sacrifice; grant thee according to thine own
heart, and fulfil all thy counsel." (Psalm 20:1, 2, 3, 4.)

Now as the Son has glorified the Father and the Father has
glorified the Son, so there is a people in whom both the Father
and the Son will be glorified. He therefore said, "And the glory
which thou gavest me I have given them; that they may be one,
even as we are one" (John 17:22); and again, "And all mine are
thine, and thine are mine; and I am glorified in them" (John
17:10.) When, then, God's goodness and mercy in the face of
Jesus Christ are manifested to this people whom he has formed
for himself that they might show forth his praise, then they give
him back his glory. But how is this done? By praising and blessing
his holy name for the manifestation of his goodness and mercy to
their soul. We thus see in what a blessed circle this glory runs.
The Father glorifies the Son; the Son glorifies the Father; both
unite in glorifying his chosen and redeemed people; and they
glorify Father and Son by giving them the glory due to their
name. We therefore read that "the Gentiles glorify God for his
mercy." But how? "Rejoice, ye Gentiles, with his people. Praise
the Lord, all ye Gentiles, and laud him all ye people." (Rom.
15:9-11.)

This is beautifully developed in the Psalm before us. It begins

with blessing and praising God. "Bless the Lord, O my soul: and
all that is within me, bless his holy name. Bless the Lord, O my
soul, and forget not all his benefits." Why was it that David called
upon his soul to bless the Lord—yea, appealed to every faculty
within him to unite in blessing his holy name? Why did he charge
it upon his soul not to forget all God's benefits, but bear them in
perpetual remembrance? For this reason, that he might render
unto God a tribute of thankful praise. Now by this God is glorified,
for whoso offereth praise glorifieth him. We cannot add to his
glory: for his glory is above the heavens. It is infinite, eternal,
ineffable. No creature therefore can add to it or take from it; but
he does permit poor worms of earth to glorify him by giving him a
tribute of thankful praise. But this we can only do by believing in
his dear Son, receiving of his fulness grace for grace, and
blessing and praising his holy name for the manifestation of his
goodness, mercy, and love, as brought into our soul by his own
divine power. This will perhaps, however, be more clear if I am
enabled in any measure to lay open and bring before you the rich
treasures stored up in our text, in which David with all his heart
praises and blesses the God of his salvation.

We may observe in it, I think, what I may perhaps call an

ascending scale; for you will observe that it contains four clauses,
and that each seems to rise one above another in offering the
tribute of praise.

Let us thus look at the words again, carefully examine them, and
see what we can find of the grace and goodness of God in them:
"Who forgiveth all thine iniquities; who healeth all thy diseases:
who redeemeth thy life from destruction; who crowneth thee with
lovingkindness and tender mercies."

The sweet Psalmist of Israel begins with praising God for the
forgiveness of all his iniquities; he rises up a step further to bless
him for the healing of all his diseases; he advances upon higher
ground still in praising him for redeeming his life from
destruction; and then he puts the crowning glory upon the whole
work by adding, "who crowneth thee with lovingkindness and
tender mercies."

In this way, with God's help and blessing, I shall this evening
attempt to handle the subject before us.

I.—"Who forgiveth all thine iniquities."

i. This is a point on which the children of God are often deeply

and painfully exercised. Yes, here it is that their souls often hang
trembling as it were in the balance. There is a question to be
settled between God and their conscience; there is something to
be manifested with power to their hearts; there is a burden to be
taken off their minds; there is a voice of mercy to be heard in
their bosom. But whence arises this question, this burden, this
need of the voice of mercy, of this manifestation of pardon? From
a sense of the state into which sin original and sin actual have
brought them. But what has made them feel this? Whence has
come the light to see, the life to feel what sin is and the evils
which sin has wrought? Is it not from God's own work upon their
heart? He therefore begins with laying their sins as a burden
upon their conscience. Sin has caused a separation between God
and them, as he himself speaks: "Behold, the Lord's hand is not
shortened, that it cannot save; neither his ear heavy, that it
cannot hear: but your iniquities have separated between you and
your God, and your sins have hid his face from you, that he will
not hear." (Isa. 59:1, 2.) Nor is this all. We are "alienated and
enemies in our mind from God by wicked works" (Col. 1:21); and
in the days of our flesh we were "without Christ, being aliens
from the commonwealth of Israel, and strangers from the
covenants of promise, having no hope, and without God in the
world." (Ephes. 2:12.) There is then a barrier between them and
God; and he can have nothing to do with them and they nothing
to do with him until this barrier is removed. But it must be felt to
be a barrier before there can be any sensible removal of it. To
discover this barrier to us in its reality, its greatness, its
insuperable nature, is a part of that divine teaching which is
promised to the people of God. When, then, the Lord the Spirit
begins his secret and sacred work upon their heart; when he lays
judgment to the line and righteousness to the plummet, he
discovers to them this barrier by discovering their iniquity. The
work of the blessed Spirit, in commencing the work of grace, is to
convince us of sin, to bring our iniquities to view, and to lay them
upon our conscience, to reveal the justice of God, as aimed and
directed against them, and thus manifest his unspeakable
displeasure against all transgression and all transgressors. Until
this work is wrought with a divine power, we are what the
Scripture calls "dead in trespasses and sins." The first work of
grace upon the soul, therefore, is to quicken the soul into spiritual
life, and thus bring our iniquities to light, which before were
neither seen nor felt, and especially those glaring and open sins
in which most of us were found walking. It is he also which
discovers to us our secret sins, as working in thought and
imagination, and often in lust and desire, if we have not been
guilty of flagrant offences, and by setting them in the light of
God's countenance, to show us how offensive they are in the eyes
of infinite purity. All this is very trying and distressing, and by
some it seems to be considered needless. But it is a solemn fact,
that until we are exercised with a burden of guilt; until we know
by painful experience our lost and ruined condition; until we see
something of the holiness and purity of God; until we have some
apprehension of his inflexible justice and terrible displeasure
against sin, we trifle with him, trifle with our immortal interests,
play fast and loose with our own souls, live regardless of all the
claims God has upon us as the creatures of his hand. Besides
which, we have naturally many false and foolish ideas about
religion; easily satisfy ourselves with some floating opinions
about it, and settle down very quietly into some beaten track of
formality and self-righteousness, or take up with a light, loose
profession. Now we must be awakened, aroused, and, as it were,
rescued like a brand from the burning from all these deceptions,
that our heart may be made sincere and right before God. This
then is the reason why, when the time comes for God to work
with power upon a sinner's heart, that he brings his sins to view,
that he sets them in the light of his countenance, and lays them
with more or less weight as a burden upon his soul. Now observe
the effect of this and what springs out of it. This question arises
in the sinner's breast, how his sins can be pardoned? He feels
that he cannot live or die with unpardoned sin resting upon his
head. If his iniquity be not forgiven, how can he stand before the
bar of God when he bringeth every secret work into judgment? It
was this feeling which made the poor publican cry, "God be
merciful to me a sinner;" which made the Philippian gaoler
exclaim, "What must I do to be saved?" This made David say,
"There is no soundness in my flesh because of thine anger:
neither is there any rest in my bones because of my sin. For mine
iniquities are gone over mine head: as a heavy burden they are
too heavy for me. My wounds stink and are corrupt because of
my foolishness. I am troubled; I am bowed down greatly; I go
mourning all the day long." (Psa. 38:3, 4, 5, 6.) O, how many of
the dear children of God—some from self-righteousness, some
from ignorance, some from the confusion of their minds, some
from the temptations of Satan, some from sitting under legal
ministers, and most from a deep sense of their helplessness and
inability to bring any peace into their own bosom—are long and
painfully exercised with this matter of the forgiveness of sin, and
how they shall personally and experimentally realise it. Now if we
are saints at all, and are amongst the number of those who are
believers in Christ Jesus, "God hath blessed us (that is, already
blessed us) with all spiritual blessings in heavenly places in Christ
Jesus;" and amongst them with the grand blessing of
forgiveness; for "in him we have redemption through his blood,
even the forgiveness of sins, according to the riches of his grace."
"Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who
hath blessed us with all spiritual blessings in heavenly places in
Christ. In whom we have redemption through his blood, the
forgiveness of sins, according to the riches of his grace." (Ephes.
1:3, 7.) I want you to see, believe, and feel this, that the
forgiveness of sin is a blessing with which God has already
blessed the whole of his dear family. We therefore read: "And
you, being dead in your sins and the uncircumcision of your flesh,
hath he quickened together with him, having forgiven you all
trespasses." (Col. 2:13.) You see from this testimony that God
has forgiven all the trespasses of those whom he has quickened
together with Christ. This is a part of the ministry of
reconciliation, as the apostle testifies: "To wit, that God was in
Christ, reconciling the world unto himself, not imputing their
trespasses unto them; and hath committed unto us the word of
reconciliation." (2 Cor. 5:19.) But we need something more than
the blessed fact. We want the sweet and personal experience of
it. To get then at the blessing; to know its power and sweetness
in our own breast; to receive it as from the mouth of God, and to
know from the testimony of the Holy Spirit that God has
pardoned all our sins, forgiven all our iniquities, cast all our sins
behind his back—how many of God's dear people who are "saints
and faithful in Christ Jesus," and are quickened together with
Christ, are exercised upon this point nearly all their days; and
many come even to a dying bed before the clear forgiveness of
their sins is sealed with power upon their conscience. It is difficult
to know why the blessing is often so long delayed; but doubtless
God has wise purposes to answer in thus exercising them. He
knows how closely self-righteousness cleaves to them, and he
uses these means to strip them of all their wisdom, strength, and
power, to empty them thoroughly of all creature goodness, and to
convince them that nothing but the blood of Jesus Christ,
experimentally sprinkled upon the conscience, cleanseth from all
sin.

ii. But let us now take a view of the expression "all our iniquities."
How wide the scope, how ample the field, do these words open to
our spiritual eye! And do you not observe what strong language
the Holy Ghost employs here and elsewhere in testifying against
sin, but not too strong at all for the circumstances, nor too strong
for the feelings of an awakened soul? Men have invented many
terms to lower the character of sin, and pare it down so as to
diminish its weight. But the Holy Spirit in our text calls it
"iniquities." It is a strong word, but not too strong for any
sensible sinner, when we see sin in its true light: for when its
awful magnitude and deep dye are discovered to our awakened
conscience, language itself falls short of expressing what it
appears as contrasted with the view of the infinite purity of God.
When, too, we look at the magnitude of these iniquities as
aggravated by peculiar and personal circumstances; how many
have been committed against warnings, against convictions,
against the whisperings of our own conscience, against the
admonition of friends; how in various instances we have broken
through the hedge of every resolution and done violence to our
own knowledge of right and wrong, and yet been drawn on by the
power of temptation, been inveigled and entangled by some
darling lust, overcome by the strength of some inward corruption,
shut our eyes to the consequences, and felt as though that sin we
would commit, that lust we would indulge, that gratification we
would have if it cost our soul, O how aggravated have our
iniquities been if this has been our unhappy case, and it is the
case of many; for so desperately wicked is the heart of man, so
determined to have its fill of evil, that I have sometimes felt and
said that, left of God, a man would sin one moment and jump
into hell the next. Now when God begins to lay these sins thus
aggravated upon his awakened conscience, to set his iniquities
before his eyes, how low it sinks a man; how it brings him
sometimes to the very brink of hell; how it shuts him up at times
almost in gloomy despair; how it exercises his mind whether his
dreadful iniquities can ever be pardoned. He views his own case
as peculiar. Every man best knows his own circumstances, for
these are mostly hidden from all but himself. Many sins, unknown
to others, are well known to him. The circumstances under which
he sinned; the violence done to his own conscience in sinning:
the aggravated state of the case, under temptations known only
to the individual: all these, as they are opened up to him by the
Spirit, and he sees light in God's light, form a heavy and peculiar
burden, under which he is ready to sink. But all this is to teach
him that nothing but the blood of Christ can cleanse from all sin.
It is to drive away all creature hope, break to pieces every
expectation formed and centering in the creature; to show him
that as the blood of bulls and goats in ancient days could not put
away sin, so now no repentance, no reformation, no floods of
tears, no amount of prayers, no external change, can ever put
away his iniquities. We know, comparatively speaking, little of the
inward experience of many whose faces we often see in our
midst; and how many hidden and silent ones are shut up in
condemnation, sighing and groaning for some application of the
blood of sprinkling to their conscience. Now the Lord is often
pleased to raise up a hope in his soul that his sins are put away.
Sometimes he gets a view by faith of the sufferings and sacrifice,
bloodshedding and death of the Lord Jesus; and though the blood
of sprinkling is not clearly or fully revealed unto, or sprinkled
upon his conscience, yet he sees it by the eye of faith, as
sprinkled upon the cross, and the only possible atonement for sin.
He thus gets, as it were, in the distance a passing view of a
suffering Christ, a bleeding Jesus, an atoning Lamb of God, as the
children of Israel looked upon the serpent in the wilderness; and
though this falls very short of what he looks and longs for, yet it
raises up a hope and expectation of coming mercy. It also
effectually cuts off all expectation of pardon and peace from any
other quarter, and thus fixes his eyes upon the cross as the only
spot where mercy and justice meet together, the only fountain
open for all sin and uncleanness, the only place where a guilty
sinner can meet with a forgiving God. Faith being sometimes
much strengthened by this view of the cross, and much softness
of spirit, and melting of heart being found and felt at the sight his
hopes rise very high, and it seems almost as if Christ was about
to speak a forgiving word to his soul and to manifest himself in
the power of his blood and love. But the view fades away, and he
is suffered to doubt again, to fear again, to distrust every mark
he has received of the mercy of God; to call in question
everything he has tasted, felt and handled of the word of life,
until sooner or later in some unexpected moment Jesus is pleased
to reveal himself to his soul, to bring the blood of sprinkling into
his conscience, and give him a clear evidence that all his sins are
pardoned, and all his iniquities, so great, so black, so aggravated,
are forgiven.

But though this is for the most part the usual way, we must not
lay down a rigid, precise, fixed rule, and erect an unbending
standard on this point. Some have the substance of pardon in the
feeling who have not the clear application of the blood. They, as
the apostle speaks, "receive the atonement" (Rom. 5:1), that is,
receive it into their hearts by faith, and feel its blessed effects as
revealing peace with God. They have therefore the substance of
pardon and peace, by receiving that through which they flow;
they have the enjoyment of it, the deliverance it brings, the
liberty it produces, the love which it draws forth, the repentance
and godly sorrow which it creates, though the words, "thy sins be
forgiven thee," might not have been spoken with a special power
to their soul. They have received Christ into their hearts in the
full efficacy of his atoning blood, which they could not do till he
came nigh and manifested himself, and they have all the fruits
and effects of his dying love by which they love him and live to
his praise.

iii. But now take another point into your spiritual view—God never
forgives by halves. We look at this sin and we look at that sin, we
call to mind this and that slip or fall, and sometimes say with
bitter grief and mournful cry, "O, that I had never committed that
sin! O, that I had never broken out in this or that direction! O,
that my lust, my pride, my covetousness, my angry temper, my
foolish lightness, my carelessness, and carnality had never
overcome me at that time! O, that I had never spoken that
foolish word, done that sad thing, that I had never fallen into that
snare of the flesh! O, that I had never got entangled in that awful
trap of the devil!" Have you not sometimes pondered over the
various ways in which you have been drawn aside into some bye-
path, until you are almost ready to give up all hope and to sink
into despair, as scarcely believing it possible that grace could be
in your heart? Thus we keep looking at individual sins, weighing
this and that in the balance of conscience, not seeing the awful
number of the whole as an overwhelming mass; and we expect
perhaps that God will forgive this particular sin and that particular
sin, as if that were the great thing to be done. God does not
forgive so. He forgives all or none. It is either a full remission of
all our sins, or pardon of no single one of them. Have I not
already brought before you that gracious word from the
Colossians, "having forgiven you all trespasses?" (Col. 2:13.) And
what a testimony there is through the Scriptures to the same
precious truth. How John says, "The blood of Jesus Christ
cleanseth from all sin." (1 John 1:7.) How our gracious Lord
declares, "all manner of sin and blasphemy shall be forgiven unto
men." (Matt. 12:31.) How the prophet declares, "thou wilt cast all
their sins into the depths of the sea" (Micah 7:19); and how
blessedly does the Lord himself speak, "I have blotted out as a
thick cloud thy transgressions, and, as a cloud, thy sins" (Isaiah
44:22); and again, "In those days, and in that time, saith the
Lord, the iniquity of Israel shall be sought for, and there shall be
none; and the sins of Judah, and they shall not be found: for I
will pardon them whom I reserve." (Jer. 50:20.) How plainly and
clearly do all these testimonies preach as with one united,
harmonious voice that precious, glorious doctrine, that where
there is forgiveness there is a forgiving of all iniquities, a casting
of all trespasses behind God's back, a full and free, eternal,
irreversible blotting out and putting away of every sin and every
transgression.

Now nothing short of such a full, free, complete and perfect

forgiveness could satisfy God or satisfy us. It could not satisfy
God; for one sin unforgiven would shut us out of heaven as much
as a thousand. It could not satisfy us, either in earth or heaven.
If the guilt of one sin remained upon our conscience at death, it
would fill us with fear, and could we enter heaven with it? The
guilt of that one sin would make us ever tremble before the purity
of God, and mar ever rising joy. Neither sin in its guilt nor sin in
its filth, though it be, so to speak, but the smallest that could be
committed by man, could stand before the purity of God in glory.
We thus see why all sin must be forgiven, washed away, cast
behind God's back, or there is no standing before him, who is a
consuming fire. We need not then be ever dwelling upon
individual sins, but should be ever casting ourselves into that sea
of love and blood in which all are drowned and for ever washed
away.

II.—But I now pass on to my next point, where I find the Psalmist

rising a step higher in what I have called the "ascending scale:"
"Who healeth all thy diseases."

i. When the Lord first begins his work of grace upon our heart, we
are not sensible of the disease of sin as thoroughly infecting the
whole of our nature. We are like a person attacked with some
incipient disease. He feels himself what is called out of sorts, his
general health impaired, his nerves unstrung, his appetite
capricious, his flesh and strength wasting. He sees these
symptoms of illness, but does not know what those symptoms
indicate, and very probably are marks of some fatal disease. He
spits blood, perhaps, and has a pain in his side, a hacking cough,
perspires much at night, and has other marks of consumption,
but he does not see that these are merely indications of a very
grave malady. So we look at this sin or that sin, which are merely
symptoms of a thoroughly corrupt and diseased nature; far
deeper than the outbreakings of it, which, comparatively
speaking, are but eruptions in the skin; or to speak more
scripturally, like those signs of leprosy which Moses describes in
Leviticus. (Lev. 13.) We are, perhaps, like a consumptive patient,
who thinks that if he can but get the cough cured, or the pain
removed, or the hectic flushes abated, get a little flesh put upon
his bones, and feel more strong and active, he would soon be
well. And so he would; but, alas! these are but symptoms, and
there is no use curing the symptoms while the disease remains
and is daily gaining strength. So there is no use looking at this or
that sin, and trying to cure this or that evil when, as the prophet
speaks, "from the sole of the foot, even unto the head, there is
no soundness in it, but wounds and bruises and putrefying sores."
(Isa. 1:6.) We may go on sometimes in this way for a long time,
hoping and hoping that as this and that sin is cured, we shall, by
and by, get cured of the whole. But after a time God the Spirit, as
he keeps searching the heart and casting fresh light into the
mind, discovers the fatal secret by leading us to see, feel, and
realise the disease of sin as infecting the whole of our nature. But
this discovery fills a man with consternation and dismay; for this
is now his language, "I have committed iniquity; I have sinned
against God. These sins he has mercifully pardoned. But O! after
he has pardoned all these sins and healed all these backslidings,
to find that there is a secret something within me which is ever
breeding fresh!" We thus learn that there is no making a clean bill
of health, and reporting that all taint of infection has
disappeared; no casting off and throwing away all sin like a worn-
out filthy garment, without a rag being left behind to hold and
disseminate fresh disease. But it is rather like destroying one
crop of vermin, and leaving behind a whole host which have slyly
crept away, and are ever breeding in the dark vermin afresh. Or
it is like some malady that may seem for a time subdued and
apparently cured, and then breaks forth again with double
virulence. How, for instance, we see sometimes consumption or
cancer apparently cured, and yet how they break forth again
worse than before. So it is with that dreadful disease of sin which
has infected the whole of our being. It may for a time seem
subdued, removed, and almost if not fully healed; but again and
again it breaks forth worse than before—not worse I mean in
outward act, but worse in inward sense and experimental feeling.

But have you ever considered the meaning of the word "disease,"
as descriptive of our state by nature? You know what a diseased
body is, or, what is worse, a diseased mind; how in both of these
cases everything is wrong, out of order, thrown off its right
balance, and the consequence perpetual pain and suffering. So it
is with the disease of sin. It makes everybody wrong and
everything wrong; disorders the eye, distempers the ear, turns
every benefit into bane, and wholesome food into little less than
poison. Everything is a burden, full of labour, weariness, and
dissatisfaction; life a misery, days wearisome, and nights
sleepless.

ii. But having thus seen the general character of disease, let us
now look at some of the special diseases which infect our nature,
and two above all others as most generally known and felt with
which God's people are afflicted.

1. The first which I shall name is the disease of unbelief. When

the blessed Spirit convinces of sin, he convinces also of unbelief.
(John 16:9.) But this sin of unbelief usually is not felt so much as
the guilt of particular and more open sins. At any rate, we do not
usually see and feel it at first as an inbred disease. When faith
was strong, as it was when the Lord appeared, unbelief did not
come to the fore. It hung behind, as it were, invisible in the
shade; it lurked in the secret recesses of the heart, undiscovered,
like a thief in the night. But after a time, when faith begins to
slacken, this disease of unbelief comes to view; it crops out to the
surface, like the hard rock that was covered over with soft
herbage; when flowers and grass grew upon it, its depth and
hardness were not seen. But we soon begin to find under all this
soft and springy turf there lies a hard rock, going down into the
very bowels of the earth. O how this wretched unbelief rises to
view as the turf is stripped off! How like an unbidden and
unwelcome guest at a marriage feast, its very presence mars all
comfort, beats out of the hand every sweet morsel of food or
cheerful cup, arising like a spectre at the very time when we want
its company least, robbing us of all peace and happiness, and as
if dropping poison into the very springs of life. There is, I believe,
scarcely any other disease of the soul which seems so thoroughly
to have spread itself through the whole of our being, to produce
such distempered views of God and ourselves, and set itself so
determinately against the word of God itself. In these points it
much resembles a diseased mind, such as we often see in
unhappy individuals, which sees nothing aright and takes
everything wrong; which you can neither rectify nor comfort,
persuade nor guide, but which is ever listening to its own
persuasions, and can listen to nothing else.

2. But another disease is helplessness. It is so naturally.

Weakness, prostration of strength, inability to raise hand or foot
may be and is a mark of very serious disease; nay, a disease in
itself. Look at that poor paralytic lying helpless upon his bed:
what a miserable object he is. Look at that poor saint, as unable
to raise hand or foot, as unable to move any one of his spiritual
limbs as the paralytic patient himself. Is not his helplessness a
disease as great and dangerous as unbelief can be? Some
diseases are attended with much bodily pain and suffering. How
sharp, how lancinating are the pains of cancer. How torturing is
tic, how painful is pleurisy, how racking and severe is headache.
So it is with some spiritual diseases. What fiery darts Satan can
shoot into our mind; what painful corruptions he can stir up; what
vile suggestions he can infuse. What sudden sharp pains there
are in the soul under the injection of these fiery darts of Satan,
like the lancinating pangs of cancer, or the acute throb of sudden
tic. But there are complaints in which the patient gradually sinks
without any very great pain, without much apparently severe
disease. In consumption, though it is a great mistake to think
that usually it is a painless disease, yet some gradually seem to
decay until they die of sheer exhaustion, without suffering acute
pain. So in paralysis and similar complaints, as softening of the
brain. May we not trace a similar analogy in the case of spiritual
diseases? Some of God's people are not so painfully exercised as
others with the fiery darts of the devil, nor so tormented with the
workings of inward corruption, nor so pressed down by the power
of unbelief. Their chief complaint is a sense of helplessness. They
seem so languid in the things of God, have such a fainting spirit,
such an inability to press forward, such a gradual weakening of
every faculty, and a sinking down into self as though they must
sink away and die under positive exhaustion. Now all this is the
effect of spiritual disease; it springs from the corruption which
entered into and took possession of us at the fall.

3. But let us look a little further still. The effect of the fall was not
only to produce special diseases but to fill us with disease
throughout. It is so sometimes naturally. Some persons are full of
disease, like the man spoken of in the gospel, "full of leprosy"
(Luke 5:12); their whole system and constitution thoroughly
vitiated by hereditary complaints. So sin has thoroughly diseased
us, poisoned our very blood. It has diseased our understanding,
so as to disable it from receiving the truth; it has diseased our
conscience, so as to make it dull and heavy, and undiscerning of
right and wrong; it has diseased our imagination, polluting it with
every idle, foolish, and licentious fancy; it has diseased our
memory, making it swift to retain what is evil, slow to retain what
is good; it has diseased our affections, perverting them from all
that is heavenly and holy, and fixing them on all that is earthly
and vile.

But O what an unspeakable mercy it is that God has provided not

only a Redeemer in the Lord Jesus, so as to insure the
forgiveness of sins through the redemption which he has
wrought, but has made him also the Healer of diseases; not only
constituted him as a Saviour, and a great one, but a Physician:
not only given him out of his own bosom to shed his precious
blood to put away sin by the sacrifice of himself, but raised him
from the dead, and set him at his own right hand, that he might
heal by his word "all manner of sickness and all manner of
disease." He thus becomes "Jehovah Rophi," the Lord my healer.
As he testifies of himself: "I am the Lord that healeth thee."
(Exodus 15:26.) View, then, God's poor diseased people; see
them lying as it were in Bethesda's porch, all waiting for the
approach of the great Physician; knowing that one look of his
eye, one touch of his hand, one word of his mouth, can heal all
their diseases. See this poor, diseased family of God, some
complaining of one disease, some of another, some of a third; but
all like a number of sick folk, gathered at the door of a
dispensary, or patients lying in the wards of a hospital, or such a
suffering mass of humanity as would meet your eye after some
dreadful railway collision, where you would see some almost
dying, others fainting away with pain and terror, others lying
upon the road with broken limbs and blood streaming down their
faces, but all feeling the terrible shock. So it is with God's poor,
diseased family: one you may hear complaining of his broken
limbs, another of his fluttering, agitated heart, a third of the
internal wounds of his conscience, a fourth of his bruised hands
and maimed feet; but each and all mourning and languishing
under a sense of the disease of sin, and the sad effects which the
collision of the fall has wrought. But turn your eyes away and
look in another direction. See here approaching the gracious
Lord, and going round, so to speak, from ward to ward,
addressing a kind word to this patient, administering a healing
balm to that, giving a smile of encouragement to a third. See too
how every eye follows him, all seeking some help from his hand.
Now when this gracious healer sends his word, for it is by his
word that he heals (Psalm 107:20), it brings with it
instantaneously a medicinal power. Was it not so in the days of
his flesh? How, at a word from his lips, a touch from his hand,
every disease fled. So it is now. When he speaks all complaint
ceases; disease disappears under its touch; pain and suffering
are assuaged by his kind look, his sympathising voice, his
gracious smile: and the very appearance of the Physician, though
but for a few moments, does the patient good.

But how does he heal these diseases? He heals them chiefly by

subduing them; for in this life they are never thoroughly healed.
The promise runs: "He will subdue our iniquities." (Micah 6:7.) To
subdue them is to restrain their power. Thus he sees one
suffering under the power of unbelief. He gives him faith; this
subdues his unbelief. Here is another poor languid patient, dying
of exhaustion: he gives him strength. Here is a third mourning
under his corruptions: he gives a drop of his blood to purge his
conscience, and a taste of his love to warm his heart. He sees a
fourth crying under the strong assaults of Satan: with one look
Satan flies and the soul is set free. Thus with infinite wisdom
blended with infinite love and power, he passes on from bed to
bed of every sick patient, administering health wherever he goes.
O what a blessed thing it is to know something of having our
diseases healed; that there is one who can sympathise with his
poor afflicted people, who can stretch forth his hand to heal, or
apply a word suitable to their case! With infinite skill and power,
this blessed physician has a remedy for every disease, and the
remedy is always felt to be exactly suitable to the exigency of the
case. It goes, so to speak, at once to the right spot: it heals the
malady wherever it be, and whatever it be, just in the right way,
and just at the right time. No disease is too deep for it to reach,
no complaint too complicated for it to cure, and no secret
complaint hidden even from the patient's own eyes which he
cannot dispel by his look and heal by his word. O then how good
it is to bring all our diseases before the Lord! In a case of bodily
sickness or painful complaint we uncover freely our malady to a
physician whom we can trust; we tell him every circumstance and
disclose every symptom. So should we go to the Lord with all our
diseases, tell him all our complaints, unfold to him all our
sorrows, and fully and freely lay before him everything that
burdens the conscience, pains the mind, distresses the soul,
looking and waiting until he speaks the word, and every malady is
healed.

III.—But we pass on to the next step in the ascending scale.

"Who redeemeth my life from destruction."

The first step was the forgiveness of all iniquities; the second the
healing of all diseases; the third is the redemption of life itself
from destruction, insuring thereby the certain salvation of the
soul.

When God commences the work of grace he plants spiritual life in

his people's hearts, but this life is exposed to a thousand foes and
a thousand fears. The preservation then of this life is in some
points a greater miracle and a richer mercy than the healing of
disease. Would it not be a greater triumph of medical skill, if a
physician could guarantee you from all attacks of illness, or
prolong your life for ten years, than if he cured you of some
passing complaint? To redeem then our life from destruction is a
higher mercy and a greater miracle than healing present disease.
For let us consider what this life is exposed to, and then we shall
see what a marvel it is that it is kept alive in a sinner's breast,
when he is surrounded on every hand with that which but for the
mighty power of God must inevitably destroy it. For we may be
said to be moral suicides, as God declared to Ephraim: "O,
Ephraim, thou hast destroyed thyself." Is not this a true bill?
Does not thy conscience fall under it as a well founded
accusation? Hast thou not willingly with thine eyes open run into
some sin, which, but for God's mercy and upholding hand, would
have proved thy certain destruction? Have you not stood upon
the very brink of some deep pit down into which another step
would have plunged you? You do not learn this lesson at first. You
look back sometimes to the time when God was pleased to
deposit his life in your breast. It was a memorable season with
you, for he then communicated his fear, and made your
conscience alive and tender. But though convinced of sin you did
not then know the evils of your heart. But if your profession has
been of any long standing, and especially if you have been much
exercised with temptation, you now look back and wonder how
the life of God has been preserved so many years in your soul.
You have been sunk sometimes into such carnality that you could
find scarcely any difference between yourself and the most carnal
professor. You have felt such emptiness of all good, such
proneness to all evil, and seemingly such a careless abandonment
of the things which at one time you held with such warmth and
tenderness, that you trembled lest you should prove a poor
empty professor, worse than those against whom you have so
often spoken. Now when you have been sunk under the weight
and guilt of these things laid upon your conscience, you have
wondered how you stood in days past, where you stand now, how
and why you are what you are, and have not been swallowed up,
overcome, and carried away into the pit of destruction.
Sometimes Satan has tempted you to suicide; sometimes to give
up all your profession; sometimes to blaspheme the name of
God; sometimes to disbelieve every sacred truth; sometimes to
think the Bible altogether inconsistent, confused, and
contradictory, and that all religion itself was but a delusion. You
have had all these things working in your mind till you have
trembled lest you should turn out at last a vile infidel, or die in
despair. Yet hitherto God has kept you: he has preserved your
life from destruction. David said, "I am as a wonder to many"
(Psalm 71:7), but you can say, "I am a wonder to myself." The
world, the devil, and your own evil heart all have been for years
aiming at this precious life of God, all stretching out their hands
to strangle and suffocate it; and yet, mysterious wisdom,
unspeakable grace, and tender compassion! how he has kept the
holy principle alive, not suffered his fire to die out from the altar,
or the lamp in the temple to expire for want of fresh oil. O, the
mystery of redeeming love! O, the blessedness of preserving
grace to have our life redeemed from destruction! We can look
back, it may be, to sundry places in our lives, when, like David,
we could say, there was but a step between us and death, and
yet we have been preserved, upheld, and kept by the power of
God through faith unto salvation. Observe the expression,
"redeemed," and how it connects the soul with the work of
redemption by the Lord Jesus. Christ has redeemed our life by his
own precious blood. Such a price being paid for it, it cannot be
lost.

A sight and sense of this sinks the soul very low, and yet sets the
Lord very high. It makes us see how great a thing redemption is,
how wonderful the love of God, how incessant his tender care and
preserving power, how blessed and yet how mysterious the work
of grace upon the soul is, that sin cannot defile it, Satan cannot
quench it, nor anything in earth or hell effectually destroy it.

IV.—But we now come to our last point, the crowning point of all,
the highest point in the ascending scale, which seems to set its
seal upon all the foregoing: "He crowneth thee with
lovingkindness and tender mercies."

i. The coronation of a king puts the last and highest seal upon his
reigning authority. This made the spouse say, "Go forth, O ye
daughters of Zion, and behold king Solomon with the crown
wherewith his mother crowned him in the day of his espousals,
and in the day of the gladness of his heart." (Song Sol. 3:11.)
And what a day will that be when the anti-typical Solomon is
crowned Lord of all. Thus there is a crown put upon the soul
which is healed of all its diseases, and whose life is redeemed
from destruction. It is as if God could not be satisfied till he had
put the crown of his lovingkindness upon the soul, until he had
himself crowned the heart with his own love. And not only love,
but "lovingkindness"—kindness mingled with love, love
overflowing with kindness. Thus when God is pleased to reveal a
sense of his lovingkindness, to show how he has been at once so
kind and at once so loving; so kind in forgiving sin, so kind in
healing disease, so kind in preserving life from destruction, and
all flowing out of the bosom of his eternal love, it is a putting on
the crown of all his goodness. And he does it with his own hand:
"Who crowneth thee." God from heaven his dwelling place puts
upon the soul the crown of his lovingkindness and tender
mercies. And what is the effect? The soul puts a crown of glory
upon his head. So the soul has the crown of grace, and God has
the crown of glory. This is being crowned with lovingkindness and
tender mercies.

And O what a crown it is! How it crowns all our iniquities, hides
them from God's sight as a crown covers a monarch's brow. How
it crowns all our trials that we have had to pass through, severe
and cutting as they were at the time to the flesh. How it crowns
all our bereavements by putting upon the bereaved heart the
crown of God's lovingkindness. How it crowns all our prayers by
enabling us to see their gracious answer. How it crowns all God's
dealings with us in providence and in grace, and stamps
lovingkindness upon them all; for the crown includes everything
in it. As the Queen's crown includes her royalty, her dignity, her
power—for all are symboled thereby—so God's lovingkindness,
put upon the heart as a crown, includes and secures every
blessing for time and eternity.

ii. And what an effect it produces. It is a sense of God's tender

mercies which breaks the heart and produces real repentance and
godly sorrow for sin; for this is the feeling of the soul: "O that I
could have sinned against such tender mercy as revealed in the
Person and work, sufferings and death of the Lord Jesus. O what
a wretch ever to have sinned as I have done. O what a monster
to have given way to this and that sin and temptation, provoking
God, if possible, to cast me away for ever from his presence."
And yet his lovingkindness, his tender mercies, prevailed over all.
He would not take an advantage of me. He would not seize me in
the very act of sin and overwhelm my soul in hell. But he
mercifully brought me out of sin, and crowned me with
lovingkindness and tender mercies. This not only brings forth a
song of praise unto God, but constrains the soul, by every sweet
constraint, to walk in his fear and live to his honour and glory. O
these things come warm upon the heart wherever they are truly
felt. They are urgent motives to live to his praise and walk in his
fear; not to grieve his holy Spirit; but, being such debtors to
grace, to live, walk, and act in such a way as to bring honour to
his worthy name.

I have endeavoured this evening to lay my hand upon the state

and case of God's family, and speak a word for their
encouragement. Those who travel in the strait and narrow path
long to hear their case touched upon and entered into, and some
testimony given to the reality of the work of grace upon their
heart. So I leave it in his gracious hands, who can do with it as
seemeth good in his sight, and put on another crown, even the
crown of his own blessing, which maketh rich, and he addeth no
sorrow with it.
BALM IN GILEAD

Preached on Tuesday Evening, 27th July 1852, at Eden Street

Chapel, Hampstead Road.

"Is there no balm in Gilead; is there no physician there? why then

is not the health of the daughter of my people recovered?"
Jeremiah 8:22

A pregnant question! and asked by the prophet under very

peculiar and painful feelings. What read we in the preceding
verse? "For the hurt of the daughter of my people am I hurt; I
am black; astonishment hath taken hold on me." Whence sprang
these convulsive pangs, this deep and overwhelming
astonishment, which worked so powerfully in the mind of the
prophet as actually to distort his features and make his face
appear livid and black? Why was he hurt and wounded in spirit?
What was he astonished at? At three things, First, at the hurt of
the daughter of his people, at the deep and desperate wounds
under which Zion lay languishing; secondly, at the greatness of
the remedy which God had provided; and, thirdly, as the
malady was so desperate and the remedy so great, why the
health of the daughter of his people was not recovered?

In endeavouring, then, to open up the words of the text, I shall,

with God's blessing, attempt to show from them,

I. The desperate state of the daughter of God's people.

II. The remedy which God has provided for her desperate
condition.

III. Answer the prophet's question, "Why then is not the

health of the daughter of my people recovered?"

I. Sin is a damnable thing; and every one of God's people is

made, has been made, or will be made, to feel it so. And the
more that they see of sin, know of sin, feel of sin, the more
damnable will sin appear in their eyes, and with greater weight
and power will its dreadful guilt and filth lie upon their
conscience. Now there are but few, comparatively speaking, who
have any clear sight or any deep feeling of what sin really is; and
the reason, for the most part, is because they have such a slight,
shallow, superficial knowledge of who and what God is. But let
them once see the purity of God by the eye of faith, let them
once have a manifestation of His justice and holiness, majesty
and greatness to their soul, and let them, seeing light in His light,
have a corresponding sight and sense of the deep and desperate
state in which they are as fallen children of a fallen parent, then
will they no longer have slight, superficial feelings of the nature
and evil of sin, but will so see and feel its hideous and damnable
character as to make them cry out with Isaiah in the temple,
"Woe is me! for I am undone; because I am a man of unclean
lips, and I dwell in the midst of a people of unclean lips; for mine
eyes have seen the King, the Lord of hosts." (Isa. 6:5.)

But if we look at the words of our text, it would seem as if the

daughter of God's people, that is, the Church of God ("the
daughter of God's people" being a Hebrew idiom for God's
people), was suffering under wounds so as to need balm, and
under a complication of diseases, so as to require a physician.
There was work for the surgeon as well as for the physician; deep
and desperate wounds which needed balm, and an inward
destructive malady which required internal remedies. This is just
what sin has reduced the family of God to. God has described His
Zion as "full of wounds, and bruises, and putrifying sores." When
the Church of God fell in Adam, she fell with a crash which broke
every bone and bruised her flesh with wounds which are
ulcerated from top to toe. Her understanding, her conscience, and
her affections were all fearfully maimed. The first was blinded,
the second stupified, and the third alienated. Every mental faculty
thus became perverted and distorted. As in a shipwrecked vessel
the water runs in through every leak, so when Adam fell upon the
lee-shore of sin and temptation, and made shipwreck of the
image of God in which he was created, sin rushed into every
faculty of body and soul, and penetrated into the inmost recesses
of his being. Or to use another figure; as when a man is bitten by
a poisonous serpent the venom courses through every artery and
vein, and he dies a corrupted mass from head to foot, so did the
poison-fang of sin penetrate into Adam's inmost soul and body,
and infect him with its venom from the sole to the crown. But the
fearful havoc which sin has made is never seen nor felt till the
soul is quickened into spiritual life. O what work does sin then
make in the conscience, when it is opened up by the Spirit of
God! Whatever superficial or shallow views we may have had of
sin before, it is only as its desperate and malignant character is
opened up by the Holy Spirit that it is really seen, felt, grieved
under, and mourned over as indeed a most dreadful and fearful
reality. It is this sword of the Spirit which cuts and wounds; it is
this entrance of life and light that gashes the conscience; it is this
divine work which lacerates the heart and inflicts those deep
wounds which nothing but the "balm in Gilead" can heal. And not
only is a poor convinced sinner cut in his conscience, inwardly
lacerated and gashed by sin as thus opened up by the Spirit of
God, but, as the prophet speaks, "the whole head is sick, and the
whole heart faint." He is thus labouring under a complication of
diseases. Every thought, word, and action is polluted by sin.
Every mental faculty is depraved. The will chooses evil; the
affections cleave to earthly things; the memory, like a broken
sieve, retains the bad and lets fall the good; the judgment, like a
bribed or drunken juryman, pronounces heedless or wrong
decisions; and the conscience, like an opium-eater, lies asleep
and drugged in stupified silence. When all these master-faculties
of the mind, the heads of the house, are so drunken and
disorderly, need we wonder that the servants are a godless,
rebellious crew? Lusts call out for gratification; unbelief and
infidelity murmur; tempers growl and mutter; and every bad
passion strives hard for the mastery. O the evils of the human
heart, which, let loose, have filled earth with misery and hell with
victims; which deluged the world with the flood, burnt Sodom and
Gomorrah with fire from heaven, and are ripening the world for
the final conflagration! Every crime which has made this fair earth
a present hell, has filled the air with groans, and drenched the
ground with blood, dwells in your heart and mine.

Now, as this is opened up to the conscience by the Spirit of God,

we feel indeed to be of all men most sinful and miserable, and of
all most guilty, polluted, and vile. But it is this, and nothing but
this, which cuts to pieces our fleshly righteousness, wisdom, and
strength, which slays our delusive hopes, and lays us low at the
footstool of mercy, without one good thought, word, or action to
propitiate an angry Judge. It is this which brings the soul to this
point, that, if saved, it can only be saved by the free grace,
sovereign mercy, and tender compassion of Almighty God. These
are painful lessons to learn. How trying is bodily illness! To be
parched by fever, racked by internal pain, with nerves unstrung,
temples throbbing, limbs tottering, appetite gone, are heavy
afflictions. Wounds also festering, abscesses gathering, ulcers
spreading, cancers eating—what a catalogue of ills this poor flesh
is heir to! Yet these are but types of the maladies and wounds
which the fall has brought into the soul. But as it is one thing to
read of disease in books and another to be sick oneself, one thing
to walk through the wards of a hospital and another to lie there a
dying patient; so it is one thing to know the fall by theory and
another to feel it by experience. This miserable state, brought
upon us and into us by the fall, all the people of God must in
some measure feel. It is of no use mincing the matter and saying
that a person can be saved by the grace of God and the blood of
Christ, without knowing anything of the depth of misery and
wretchedness into which he is sunk as the fallen child of a fallen
sire. We must go down into the depths of the fall to know what
our hearts are and what they are capable of; we must have the
keen knife of God to cut deep gashes in our conscience and lay
bare the evil that lies so deeply imbedded in our carnal mind,
before we can enter into and experience the beauty and
blessedness of salvation by grace.

How the saints of old were led down into these depths! See the
tears with which David watered his midnight couch; mark the
lamentations of Jeremiah out of "the low dungeon;" hear the
groans of Heman "in the lowest pit, in the darkness and the
deeps;" listen to the roarings of Job, "poured out like the waters."
Were not all these choice and eminent saints of God? And whence
their dolorous cries? Was it not sin which forced them from their
heaving, labouring breasts? But if this will not satisfy you and
show you what sin is as laid on the conscience, see the co-equal
Son of God agonizing in the garden and on the cross, and then
say whether sin be a slight thing, or its burden light or small.

Now it was seeing and feeling this which made the prophet cry, "I
am black; astonishment hath taken hold on me." When he saw
himself so polluted and vile; when he viewed the Church of God
pining and languishing with the sickness of sin, his very features
gathered blackness; he seemed amazed that man should be what
he is; his very soul trembled within him at a sight and sense of
God's majesty and holiness; and he could only burst forth in the
language of awe-struck wonder, "I am black; astonishment hath
taken hold on me." And so it will take hold upon us, when, under
divine tuition, we look into our hearts and see the lusts and
passions, the unbelief and infidelity, the worldly-mindedness and
carnality, the pride and covetousness, with all the hosts of evils
that lurk and work, fester and riot, in the depth of our fallen
nature. Well may we lift our hands with astonishment that the
heart of man can be capable of imagining such depths of
baseness, and that sin can so stride over the soul and trample
down every promise of a crop.

But you will say, perhaps, "You are too hard upon us; you make
us out too bad; and you use such exaggerated language, as if we
were all fit only for Newgate." I admit I use strong language,
because I feel strongly; but not exaggerated, because it is
impossible to exaggerate the evils of the heart or the depths of
the fall.

II. But it would seem that whilst the prophet was thus almost
overwhelmed with a sight and sense of sin, he had brought
before him a view of the remedy. He therefore cries out, "Is
there no balm in Gilead?" Is the case desperate? Must the
patient die of the disease? Must the poor sinner sink under his
sins? Is there no hope for him? Say that he has wandered far
away from God, forgotten Him, neglected Him, repaid all His
favours with base ingratitude, requited all His bounties and
mercies with carnality and folly—is there still no remedy? Must he
perish under the load of his iniquities and crimes? "Is there no
balm in Gilead?" Is the supply exhausted, or has its value
ceased?

(i) But what did this balm in Gilead literally signify? Gilead was a
country beyond Jordan, in which certain trees grew of great value
and rarity, from the trunk and branches of which there distilled a
highly odoriferous gum, which was said to be of sovereign
efficacy in healing wounds. We find that the Ishmaelitish
merchants to whom Joseph was sold by his brethren were taking
some of this balm to Egypt; and when Jacob would propitiate the
chief lord of Egypt, whom he knew not then to be Joseph, he
bade his sons "take a little balm" with them, as a suitable and
acceptable offering. It thus became celebrated for its healing
properties; and its very scarcity, the trees growing in no other
soil or climate, and consequent dearness, gave it a still higher
reputation. The prophet, therefore, viewing on the one hand
Zion's desperate case, and on the other God's own divinely-
contrived and appointed remedy, asks this pregnant question, "Is
there no balm in Gilead?" He looked at the hurt of the daughter of
his people, and saw her pining away in her iniquities; the veil
being taken off his own heart, he saw her like himself, beyond
description black and base. But was there no hope for him or her?
Must she go down to the chambers of death? Must she sigh out
her heart without any manifestation of pardon and peace? "Is
there no balm in Gilead?" Why, the very question implies that
there is balm in Gilead; that God has provided a remedy which is
suitable to the desperate malady; and that there is more in the
balm to heal than there is in guilt to wound; for there is more in
grace to save than there is in sin to destroy. Why, then, should
Zion so languish? Why is she so sick and sore? Why so bleeding
to death? Why does her head so droop, her hands so hang down,
her knees so totter? Why is her face so pale, her frame so
wasted, her constitution so broken? What has done all this?
Whence this sickness unto death? "Is there no balm in Gilead?"
From that far country does now no healing medicine come? Has
the balm-tree ceased to distil its gum? Is there none to gather,
none to bring, none to apply it to perishing Zion?

But spiritually viewed, what is this precious balm? Is it not the

Saviour's blood—that precious, precious blood, of which the Holy
Ghost testifieth that it "cleanseth from all sin?" Look at the
words; weigh them well; they will bear the strictest, closest
examination. "All sin;" then sins before calling, sins after calling,
sins of thought, sins of word, sins of deed, sins of omission, sins
of commission, sins against light, sins against life, sins against
love, sins against the law, sins against the gospel, sins against
God in every shape, in every form, of every name, every kind,
every hue, every blackness, one sin only excepted—the sin
against the Holy Ghost, which a believer can never commit. "The
blood of Jesus Christ cleanseth," not from some sins, not from
many sins, not from a thousand sins, not from a million sins, but
"the blood of Jesus Christ cleanseth from all sin." This is indeed
the balm, when the conscience is cut and gashed, bleeding and
sore, to allay the smart, to soothe the pain, to bring together the
edges of the wound and to make it kindly heal. Is there any other
remedy? Search the whole round of duties; run through the wide
catalogue of forms and ceremonies; examine every cell and nook
of the monastery, the convent, and the confessional; weigh every
grain of human merit and creature obedience; tithe with the
utmost nicety the anise, mint, and cummin of self-imposed
observances; hold up the hair shirt, the bleeding scourge, the
jagged crucifix, the protracted fast, the midnight vigil, the
morning prayer, and the evening hymn, and see whether all or
any of these can heal a wounded conscience. But why do I
mention these things? Are there Papists or Puseyites before me?
No. But because there really is no medium between faith in
Christ's blood and full-blown Popery. As between grace and
works, Christ's blood and human merits, there is no real medium,
so there is no standing ground between experimental religion and
Popery, between absolution by Christ and absolution by the Pope.
The Pope's real "see" is the human heart. To drive out this
Antichrist and bring in Christ is the main work of the Spirit, the
grand aim and end of the gospel.

This is the reason why the Lord, in His wonderful dealings with
the soul, makes it sink so deeply and feel so acutely. It is to drive
out heart-popery. Where was the sword forged which "wounded
one of the heads of the beast as it were to death?" In the cell of
an Augustine monk. Popery was first driven out of Luther's heart
by the law and temptation; and then smitten down by Luther's
hand. But thousands are Papists in heart who are Protestants in
creed. How many, for instance, there are who would fain heal
themselves—some by duties, some by doctrines, some by
resolutions, some by promises, some by vows, some by false
hopes, some by ordinances, some by the opinion of ministers,
some by church membership! What is this but a subtle form of
Popery? How many heal themselves in this slight way! and every
one will do so till the wound is opened up and deepened by the
Spirit of God. Then all these vain and inefficacious remedies are
seen in their true light. They do not speak peace to the
conscience; they bring no sense of pardon to the soul; the love of
God does not accompany them; the fear of judgment is not taken
away; the grave has still its terrors, and death has still its sting.
All these remedies, therefore, are found in the case of the child of
God to be utterly inefficacious, because they cannot heal the
wounds, the deep wounds, that sin has made.

(ii) But the question is also asked, "Is there no physician

there?" We want a physician as well as balm, and one who can
fully enter into the very state of the case. Now, a physician
naturally ought to be a man of deep skill and large research, of
thorough knowledge and great tenderness. He should
understand, and rightly appreciate every symptom, and know
exactly what remedies to apply. But, spiritually, what a physician
we need! We are afflicted throughout with disease! "The whole
head is sick and the whole heart faint!" We want, therefore, a
physician who knows all our secret maladies, who is perfectly
acquainted with heart disease and head disease, who sees all our
backslidings in lip and life, our various misgivings, doubts and
fears, coldness and deadness, helplessness and inability, with all
the workings of unbelief and infidelity, and the desperate
aboundings of our filth and folly. We want a physician who can
look into our hearts, and perfectly understand all these
aggravated symptoms, and yet deal with us with the greatest
tenderness, as well as the deepest wisdom and the most
consummate skill. There is this almighty Physician; and if we are
enabled by grace to put ourselves into His hands, or rather, if He
take us and put us into His own hands, He will deal with us in the
most tender and gentle, and yet the most efficacious manner
possible. Still, it will at times be very painful to be under His
hands, for He will touch the sore places, and probe the deep
wounds, and some of His remedies will be very severe, bitter, and
pungent. Yet with all this apparently rough handling, He will
display the most infinite wisdom, the most consummate patience,
and the tenderest love.

III. When the prophet, then, had taken this solemn view of the
hurt of the daughter of his people, and had seen, too, by faith,
"the balm in Gilead and the physician there," he asks, "Why then
is not the health of the daughter of my people recovered?" clearly
implying that although there was balm in Gilead, and a blessed
Physician there, yet the health of the daughter of his people was
not recovered. And is not this the case with many of God's
people now? They are cut, wounded, lacerated by sin, though
they know, at least in their judgment, that there is balm in
Gilead, and that there is a Physician there. They are not seeking
salvation by the works of the law, they are not trusting to their
own righteousness, they are not halting between two opinions,
they know that there is no hope but in the blood and
righteousness of the Lord Jesus Christ. And yet their wounds are
not healed, nor their sickness relieved. But if there be balm in
Gilead, and if there be a Physician there, why is not their health
recovered?

But let us not here impeach either the reality of the malady or the
sufficiency of the remedy. It is certain that the balm of a
Saviour's blood has healed thousands, and that there is salvation
in no other name and by no other way, for "without shedding of
blood there is no remission." It is equally certain that this great
Physician has cured the most desperate diseases, diseases past
all human help; it is also certain that this blood is never applied in
vain, and that this Physician has an ear to hear, a heart to feel,
and a hand to relieve.

Yet still there may be certain wise and sufficient reasons why this
balm may not be immediately applied or this Physician not at
once stretch forth His healing hand.

(i) The patient may not have sunk deep enough into the
malady. Some of God's people are often wondering why they do
not know more of pardoning love, and of the application of the
blood of the Lamb to their conscience; why they have not a
clearer testimony and a more unwavering assurance of their
interest in the everlasting covenant; why they have so much
bondage and so little liberty, and, with a clear sight of the
remedy, enjoy so little of its application. They clearly see that
there is balm in Gilead, and that there is a Physician there. Still
their "wounds stink and are corrupt because of their foolishness,"
and still the Physician delays to come. But may not this be the
reason—that they have not sunk deep enough, nor got yet into
the incurable ward? In many living souls there lurks a spirit of
self-righteousness, and a secret unacknowledged dependence on
the creature. Till that is purged away, the balm in Gilead is not
fully suitable, nor do they apply with all their heart and soul to
the great Physician. "And ye shall seek Me, and find Me, when ye
shall search for Me with all your heart." Jer 29:13

(ii) Or it may be that the due time is not come. "Humble

yourselves," says the apostle, "under the mighty hand of God,
that He may exalt you in due time." (1 Pet. 5:6.) There is "a set
time to favour Zion," and till that time is run out the Lord does
not manifest His favour. Abraham had to wait twenty-five years
for a son; Joseph two years in prison for deliverance; David seven
years to sit on the throne of Saul. It is "through faith and
patience that we inherit the promises." "The vision is yet for an
appointed time, but at the end it shall speak and not lie; though
it tarry, wait for it; because it will surely come, it will not tarry."
(Hab. 2:3.) When this set time is come, the balm will be applied,
the skill of the Physician experienced, and the health recovered.

(iii) Or there may be certain hindrances in themselves of

another kind why the balm in Gilead and why "the Physician
there" are not more deeply and experimentally known. They may
not yet have been made willing to part with all their idols; they
may still hug their sins; they may cleave to their own ruin, and
play with the serpent that bites them. Or they may be half-
hearted, may be drawn aside by pride or covetousness; the world
may have fast hold of their heart, and their affections may be too
much after earthly things. Such was Ephraim's case: "His heart
was divided, and thus he was found faulty." And what was the
consequence? "When Ephraim saw his sickness, and Judah saw
his wound, then went Ephraim to the Assyrian, and sent to King
Jareb; yet could he not heal you, nor cure you of your wound."
(Hos. 5:13.) Or it may be that the wound has been slightly
healed, and therefore has broken out worse than before. A
relapse, we know, is often worse than the original disease, and an
old wound harder to heal than a fresh one. The Lord Himself
condemns the prophets who "healed the hurt of the daughter of
His people slightly." The wound, therefore, must needs break
forth again, and the cure be thus put further off. Or there may be
some secret yet powerful temptation, under the power of which
the soul is lying. Or some darling lust which holds fast, and will
not let go, and in the baseness of the heart would rather go on
with. Or it may be sucking what sweetness it can out of
backsliding rather than be purged and cleansed by God's
searching hand. What a proof is this of the deceitfulness, the
desperate deceitfulness, the wickedness, the deep and desperate
wickedness, of the human heart! There is something in sin which
so bewitches, something in carnality which so deadens,
something in the world which so engrosses, and something in
sensual gratification that so hardens the conscience, that where
these things are pursued and indulged, the life and power of
godliness are as if buried and suffocated. The soul, indeed, may
at times cry and roar under this load of carnality and death, but
its half-heaved cries do not penetrate the vault of heaven, nor
enter into the ears of the Lord of Sabaoth.

May not this throw light on the experience of some of God's

people? How many seem to be at no clear point! They hope, they
fear; sometimes they seem to have a testimony and sometimes
none; and thus they go on perhaps for years, and many even
almost to a death-bed, before there is any clear decided work in
their consciences to slaughter and kill, or any sweet manifestation
of the mercy and love of God to heal and save them. It is true
that these, with all other matters, we must eventually trace up to
the sovereignty of God. The final answer to all inquiries why
misery and mercy were so long deferred, and came only just in
time, must still be, "The Lord will have it so." And yet however
sovereign the dispensations of God are, no one who fears His
great name should so shelter himself under divine sovereignty as
to remove all blame from himself. When the Lord asks, "Hast
thou not procured this to thyself?" the soul must needs reply.
"Yea, Lord, I surely have." This is a narrow line, but one which
every one's experience, where the conscience is tender, will
surely ratify. Though we can do nothing to comfort our own souls,
to speak peace to our own conscience, to bring the love of God
into our hearts, to apply the balm of Gilead to bleeding wounds,
and summon the great Physician to our bedsides, we may do
many things to repel one moment what we would seem to invite
the next. We cannot bring ourselves near to God, but we can and
do put ourselves far from Him; we cannot advance into the
warmth and brightness of His beams, but we can wander into
regions of cold and frost; we cannot make to ourselves a fountain
of living waters, but we can hew out a broken cistern; we cannot
live to God's glory, but we can live to our own; we cannot seek
God's honour, but we can seek our own profit; we cannot walk
after the Spirit, but we can walk after the flesh; we can be carnal,
worldly-minded, reckless, thoughtless, careless about our souls,
though we cannot be spiritually-minded, heavenly, holy, with
hearts and affections at God's right hand; we cannot make
ourselves fruitful in every good word and work, but we may, by
disobedience and self-indulgence, bring leanness into our souls,
barrenness into our frames, deadness into our hearts, coldness
into our affections, and in the end much guilt upon our
consciences. No man knows better, I believe, than myself, that
we cannot do anything of a spiritual nature to bring us near to
God, but I am equally sure that we can do many things that set
us very far from Him. Let all the shame and guilt be ours; all the
grace and glory are God's. Every drop of felt mercy, every ray of
gracious hope, every sweet application of truth to the heart,
every sense of interest, every blessed testimony, every sweet
indulgence, every heavenly smile, every tender desire, and every
spiritual feeling, all, all are of God. If ever my heart is softened,
my spirit blessed, my soul watered, if Christ is ever felt to be
precious, it is all of His grace—it is all given freely, sovereignly,
without money and without price. But can it be denied? I for one
cannot deny it, that by our carnality, inconsistency, worldly-
mindedness, negligence, ingratitude, and forsaking and forgetting
the God of our mercies, we are continually bringing leanness and
barrenness, deadness and darkness into our own souls. Thus we
are forced to plead "Guilty, guilty!" to put our mouth in the dust,
acknowledge ourselves to be vile, and confess ourselves indeed
"of sinners chief, and of saints less than the least." Yet thus does
God, in His mysterious dealings, open up a way for His sovereign
grace and mercy to visit the soul. The more we feel ourselves
condemned, cut off, gashed and wounded by a sense of sin and
folly, backslidings and wanderings from God, the lower we shall
lie, the more we shall put our mouth in the dust, the more freely
we shall confess our baseness before Him. And if the Lord should
be pleased, in these solemn moments, to open our poor blind
eyes to see something of the precious blood of the Lamb, to apply
some sweet promise to the soul, or to bring to the heart a sense
of His goodness and mercy, how sweet and suitable is that grace,
as coming over all the mountains and hills of our sin and shame.

There is, then, balm in Gilead, and there is a Physician there. This
is, and must ever be, our only hope. If there were no balm in
Gilead, what could we do but lie down in despair and die? For our
sins are so great, our backslidings so repeated, our minds so
dark, our hearts so hard, our affections so cold, our souls so
wavering and wandering, that if there were no balm in Gilead, no
precious blood, no sweet promises, no sovereign grace, and if
there were no Physician there, no risen Jesus, no Great High
Priest over the house of God, what well-grounded hope could we
entertain? Not a ray. Our own obedience and consistency? These
are a bed too short and a covering too narrow. But when there is
some application of the balm in Gilead it softens, melts, humbles,
and at the same time thoroughly heals. Nay, this balm
strengthens every nerve and sinew, heals blindness, remedies
deafness, cures paralysis, makes the lame man leap as a hart,
and the tongue of the dumb to sing, and thus produces gospel
fight, gospel heating, gospel strength, and a gospel walk. When
the spirit is melted, and the heart touched by a sense of God's
goodness, mercy, and love to such base, undeserving wretches, it
produces gospel obedience, aye, a humble obedience, not that
proud obedience which those manifest who are trusting to their
own goodness and seeking to scale the battlements of heaven by
the ladder of self-righteousness, but an obedience of gratitude,
love, and submission, willingly, cheerfully rendered, and therefore
acceptable to God, because flowing from His own Spirit and
grace.

It is the application of this divine balm which purifies the heart,

makes sin hateful and Jesus precious, and not only dissolves the
soul in sweet gratitude, but fills it with earnest desires to live to
God's honour and glory. This is the mysterious way the Lord
takes to get honour to Himself. As He opens up the depth of the
fall, makes the burden of sin felt, and shows the sinner that his
iniquities have exceeded, He brings the proud heart down, and
lays the head low in the dust; and as He makes him sigh and cry,
grieve and groan, He applies His sovereign balm to the soul,
brings the blood of sprinkling into the conscience, sheds abroad
His mercy and love, and thus constrains the feet to walk in
cheerful and willing obedience. This is obeying the precept from
right motives, right views, right influences, under right feelings,
and to right ends. This is the true Christian obedience, obedience
"in the spirit and not in the letter," an obedience which glorifies
God, and is attended by every fruit and grace of the Spirit. Thus,
wondrous to say, the more we see and feel of the depth of the
malady, the more do we prize, as God is pleased to show it, the
height and blessedness of the remedy; the lower we sink in self,
the higher we rise in Christ; the more we see of nature, the more
we admire the grace of God; the more we are harassed, and
tried, and distressed, the more suitable and precious, and God-
glorifying is the gospel of the grace of God. So that the more we
sink into the ruins of the fall, the higher we rise experimentally
into the knowledge of the gospel of the grace of God; and all this
attended, when it is genuine, by the fruits of the Spirit, a spiritual
obedience, a glorifying God, a separation from the world, and as
the Lord enables, a glorifying Him in body, soul, and spirit, which
are His.

Here, then, is the answer to the prophet's question, "Is there no

balm in Gilead?" Yes, there is, blessed be God; the blood of Jesus
and the sweet promises of the gospel. "Is there no physician
there?" Yes, blessed be God, there is, a wise, a mighty, yea, an
Almighty, an all-sufficient One. "Why then is not the health of the
daughter of my people recovered?" If not recovered, it is only
delayed and delays are not denials. The time will come, the
appointed season will roll round, and then every hindrance will be
removed. If it be the world, some affliction will be sent to wean
the heart from it. If an idol, the hand of God will take it away or
destroy its power. If it be a temptation, God will deliver from it,
or make a way of escape that the soul may be able to bear it. If
unbelief prevail, He will overcome it, and give faith a victory over
it. If there be any lust indulged, He will purge the heart from its
power and prevalence. So that our wisdom and mercy alike are to
fall into His compassionate hands, to renounce our own
righteousness, to acknowledge that we have nothing in ourselves
but filth and folly, and thus to seek His face, to call upon His
name, to hope in His mercy, and rest in His goodness; and, as He
may be pleased to shine upon the soul, to thank and praise His
holy name for the mercy He displays in Christ to the vilest of the
vile.
Here, then, is the answer to this important question, "Is there no
balm in Gilead; Is there no physician there?" Blessed be God,
there is both one and the other. "Why then is not the health of
the daughter of God's people recovered?" It is already
accomplished in the mind of God, and will be made
experimentally manifest in His own time and way.
The Battle is the Lord's

Preached at Providence Chapel, Eden Street, Hampstead Road, on

Tuesday Evening, July 29, 1851

"O our God, wilt Thou not judge them? for we have no might
against this great company that cometh against us; neither know
we what to do: but our eyes are upon Thee." 2 Chronicles 20:12

It is one thing to read the Bible as a history, and another to read

it as a mystery. The mere narration of facts in the Old Testament
is interesting and instructive. How pathetic is the history of
Joseph! How stirring is the combat of David with Goliath! How
touching the lamentations of David over Absalom! How full of
interest the whole life of Elijah! Read in the mere letter, there is
in these ancient records everything to inform the mind and touch
the heart; and many have wept over the pathetic narratives of
the Bible who have never wept over their sins.

But when we penetrate through the shell into the kernel; when
we read the Bible with a spiritual eye, and God is pleased to
communicate a measure of faith which, as the Apostle says, is
mixed with the word, and so profits the soul (Heb. 4:2); how
different then are the Scriptures of truth! When we can
appropriate the promises laid up in them, read our character
depicted in them, feel their sweetness, and have the soul
bedewed with the savour and unction that is diffused all through
them, then the Scriptures are something far better than merely
instructive or interesting. The sacred truth of God, as revealed in
the Scriptures, reaches the heart, melts the soul, softens the
spirit, touches the conscience, and brings, as a divine power
accompanies it, blessed feelings and heavenly sensations into the
bosom.
And in this way alone are the Scriptures profitably read. Thus
read, the Bible becomes a new book, perused as it were with new
eyes, and felt as with a new heart. Look, for instance, at the
narrative of incidents contained in this chapter (2 Chron. 20).
Read in the mere letter there is something very instructive in it;
but when we penetrate beneath the surface of the letter, and
read it spiritually, with a special eye to the church of God, it is
invested with a new character, and upon it is shed a holy and
blessed light.

Before, however, we enter upon the spiritual meaning of the text,

let us look at a few of the incidents connected with it.

Jehoshaphat, the godly king of Judah, was, we read, attacked by

a numerous company of enemies, and these of a race and from a
quarter quite unexpected. They were not such as formerly had
attacked them, Canaanites or Philistines, Egyptians or Ethiopians,
nor the severed tribes of Israel. But they were those who had a
kind of blood alliance with them. They were the children of Moab,
and the children of Ammon, who, you will recollect were the
illegitimate children of Lot by his incestuous connection with his
two daughters. They had thus an illegitimate relationship, a
spurious, half-blood alliance with the people of Judah. We shall,
with God's blessing, see by and by how this bears upon the
spiritual meaning. Judah at this time was very weak. She had
been brought low for her iniquities. And when this "great
company" came against her, she had no strength, no army, no
forces left to oppose them. Under these circumstances, what did
the godly king of Judah as her head and leader? He "set himself
to seek the Lord, and proclaimed a fast throughout all Judah." All
human hopes, all creature help were utterly in vain; and
therefore, as their only resource, they came to the Lord, who had
rescued and delivered them again and again. The Lord heard their
cry, and smote their enemies with confusion and destruction. I
need not enter into further particulars, but will proceed at once to
our text: "O our God, wilt Thou not judge them? for we have no
might against this great company that cometh against us; neither
know we what to do: but our eyes are upon Thee."

With God's blessing, in looking at these words, I shall consider:

I. First, What this "great company" spiritually represents.

II. Secondly, How the children of God have "no might against this
great company, neither know they what to do."

III. Thirdly, How under these circumstances they cry to the Lord,
"Wilt Thou not judge them?" And,

IV. Lastly, The fixed posture of their souls: "Our eyes are upon
Thee."

I. This "great company" of hostile invaders was, as we before

remarked, indirectly and illegitimately connected with them. They
were not heathen idolaters, alien in race and language, but the
same blood partly ran in their veins. An illegitimate flesh and
blood alliance subsisted between the invaders and the invaded.
View that circumstance spiritually. What foes chiefly invade our
peace? Those that have a flesh and blood alliance with us. The
enemies, then, that we have most reason to fear are those which
claim relationship with our fallen nature. For instance,

1. There is a "great company" of temptations; for they come for

the most part, not singly, but in troops. One temptation usually
makes way for another. A single temptation resembles a burglar
attempting to break into a house. The most bold, or the most
dexterous comes first, cuts through the shutter, lifts up the
window, enters the house, and then admits the rest; so one
temptation opens a way for the entrance of more. Let a man only
dally with temptation; let him only entertain one lust, and give it
lodging in his breast; let him only be allured by, and consent to,
one powerful besetment, that one temptation will open a way for
a whole troop of temptations to come and take possession of his
heart.

But these temptations are, like the Moabites and Ammonites, our
blood relatives. Illegitimate, indeed, and incestuous is their birth,
for Satan is their father and sin their mother; but they have in us
a nature akin to them. The same blood runs in their and our
veins. It is this unhallowed, ungodly affinity which gives
temptation such wondrous power. When temptation knocks at the
door, there is a half-sister, a traitress to the very bone, waiting in
the hall to open it and let him in. Temptation is fearful only as it
is suitable. If there were nothing in our heart in alliance with evil;
if we could reject it instantaneously, and say, "Get thee hence;" if
we could deal with temptation as the blessed Lord dealt with it,
when Peter said, "Be it far from Thee!" if we could say to every
temptation as the Lord then said to Peter, "Get thee behind Me,
Satan!" temptation would lose its power, it would drop from us as
the viper from the hand of Paul, when he shook it into the fire,
and felt no harm. But, alas! there is that in our heart which has a
blood alliance with it, which listens to it, parleys with it, and
would, but for the grace of God, fall on its neck and embrace it.

2. But there is also a "great company" of afflictions. For as with

temptation, so affliction rarely comes alone. Look at Job's case.
How affliction came after affliction, as messenger after
messenger came with evil tidings! You will find that afflictions of
body often bring affliction of mind, and that affliction in
circumstances often produces rebellion, peevishness, and
discontent. Thus we have to bear the load, not merely of natural,
but also of spiritual trouble; one, as it were, helping on and giving
force, weight and power to the other. A concurrence of trials is so
frequent, that it is a common saying, "afflictions seldom come
single." And if this be the case with men generally, much more so
is it with the people of God. "Woe is me now," cried Baruch, "for
the Lord hath added grief to my sorrow" (Jer. 45:3). "Thou hast
afflicted me with all Thy waves," complained Heman (Psa. 88:7).
This combination of troubles much increases their weight. If they
came alone, it seems as though there would be strength to bear
them; but to have affliction after affliction, and when one has
struck, as it were, the soul down, then for another to strike the
dying dead—this, this it is that gives such poignancy, weight and
acuteness to the trials of the Lord's family.

3. But, again, what a company there is of lusts! If we look at the

evils of our nature, we shall find that they too are not single. To
examine our heart is something like examining by the microscope
a drop of ditch water; the more it is looked into, the more
hideous forms appear. All these strange monsters, too, are in
constant motion, devouring or devoured; and, as glasses of
stronger power are put on, more and more loathsome creatures
emerge into view till eye and heart sicken at the sight. Such is
our heart. Superficially viewed, passably fair; but examined by
the spiritual microscope, hideous forms of every shape and size
appear; lusts and desires in unceasing movement, devouring
each other, and yet undiminished; and each successive
examination bringing new monsters to light. O what a company of
lusts! how one seems to introduce and make way for the other!
and how one, as among the insect tribe, is the sire of a million!

4. And what a company at times there is of doubts, fears, and

distressing apprehensions! What an alliance, too, not only with
our carnal mind, but with one another! "The children of Moab,
and the children of Ammon, and with them other beside the
Ammonites." And all against Judah. Temptation comes first; with
temptation comes the stirring up of lusts; and with the stirring up
of lusts comes a whole troop of doubts and fears arising from
guilt laid upon the conscience. Hart justly says, "Sin engenders
doubt." It is the evil of the heart continually manifesting itself
that gives such strength to unbelief, and adds such force to those
doubts and fears which often come as a great armed company
against the soul. A guilty conscience has a strong alliance with
doubts and fears, and this indeed makes them so formidable.

5. What a company of professors also are arrayed against a child

of God! How they are all watching for his halting! How ready to
magnify his infirmities! how eager to catch up any slip that he
may make, or anything he may say or do inconsistent. One
hounds on another. "Report it," say they, "and we will report it."
Thus they hunt in packs; and many who have never tasted the
bread of life, nor fed on the flesh of Christ, have had a sweet
repast upon the mangled limbs of a child of God.

It was not the heathen that attacked Judah, but the Moabites and
Ammonites; a spurious blood, but indirectly allied. So it is not the
profane, but the professing world, a spurious race, who attack the
living family. And surely they are "a great company," unmindful,
like the children of Ammon, of all former benefits (ver. 10), and
bent only on Judah's destruction.

Now all these "great companies" come against the children of God
at some time or other of their spiritual life. It is true that all may
not come at once; but at one time or other most of the children
of God have to fight against them all; a "great company" of
afflictions, of temptations, of lusts, of doubts and fears, or
professors, who hate the truth of God which they see in them.

II. And what can they do? They are in the same plight and spot
spiritually in which Jehoshaphat and the children of Judah were
literally and naturally.

1. Jehoshaphat speaks for himself and his people: "We have no

might against this great company." We have no weapons, no
power of resistance; we cannot meet them hand to hand, or foot
to foot; they are too many and too mighty for us; we have no
power whatever to withstand or resist them. This every true
Christian is taught and brought more or less to feel. None but
Christians really feel it, because others have their weapons. But
what makes a living man powerless is this: he knows there is no
use to fight flesh with flesh; that is, by weapons of our own
contrivance, or our own forging. A pharisee can fight in his own
strength and righteousness; he can make his vows and promises,
form his resolutions, and combat hand to hand against this "great
company." But a Christian is stripped of his carnal weapons. To
afflictions a natural man can oppose stoical endurance; to
temptation a hardened conscience; to doubts, impenitence, or
self-righteousness; to attacks from men, blow for blow. But all
these weapons have dropped from a Christian's hand; God must
fight his battles, for he cannot. He has therefore no power, nor
wisdom, nor strength, nor might against this "great company,"
for his weapons are not carnal, but spiritual; so that if he fight, it
must be in the strength of the Lord, and the power of His might.
Now when the Lord denies His gracious presence; when He does
not come into the soul in any measure of divine power and grace;
when He leaves us, as He often leaves us, to prove our own
strength by feeling utter weakness—then we come into this
experience, "We have no might against this great company."

In what a wonderful way was the Lord pleased to teach Paul this
great lesson! He was caught up to the third heaven; there he saw
and heard things unspeakable; his soul was indulged with the
greatest revelations perhaps ever given to any mortal. He comes
down from heaven to earth. And then what takes place? He has a
messenger of Satan, a thorn in the flesh to buffet him. Thus he
falls, as it were, from the heights of heaven down to the very
gates of hell. He leaves the company of God and angels, and the
presence of the glorified spirits above, and comes down to be
buffeted and plagued, harassed and beaten about by Satan. O
how mysterious was this dealing of God! How the Apostle himself
was unable to enter into this mystery, that one recently so highly
favoured should now be so deserted; that one upon whom the
Lord had bestowed such blessings should now be left in the hands
of Satan! But he learnt afterwards why he had such an
experience. The Lord said to him, "My grace is sufficient for thee;
for My strength is made perfect in weakness." But how could the
Apostle have learnt this weakness but by soul experience? Was it
not necessary for him to be buffeted by Satan, to be beaten and
roughly handled by the Prince of darkness, and to have this thorn
in the flesh continually puncturing and lacerating his soul in order
to learn it in and for himself? And can you tell me any other way
whereby we can learn the same lesson? Can we learn it from the
Bible? from books? from ministers? or the experience of others?
We may learn the theory. The experience must be learnt in
another school; and that is the school of painful and personal
experience. The Lord, to convince us then of our weakness and to
make His strength perfect in that weakness, suffers in His
providence this "great company" to come against us; and thus
teaches us that we have no might, that we cannot lift up a finger,
that we have no weapons to fight with.

Now look at your experience, you that have any, and see when
this "great company" came against you, whether you had any
strength of your own. What could you do with temptation when it
came in a powerful way? Could you master it? Could you throw
up a bank against it, and say, "Thus far shalt thou come, and no
further; and here thy proud waves shall be stayed"? Could you
say to any one temptation, "Get thee behind my back; thou shalt
not tempt me"? O when temptation creeps in like a serpent into
the carnal mind, it winds its secret way, and coils round the
heart. As the boa constrictor is said to embrace its victim, twining
his coil around it, and crushing every bone without any previous
warning, so does temptation often seize us suddenly in its
powerful embrace. Have we in ourselves any more power to
extricate our flesh from its slimy folds than the poor animal has
from the coils of the boa constrictor?

So with the corruptions and lusts of our fallen nature. Can you
always master them? Can you seize these serpents by the neck
and wring off their heads?

The doubts and fears and distressing apprehensions that come

into your soul when guilt lies hard and heavy upon your
conscience, can you say, "Begone, doubts and fears; I will have
none of you; you shall not touch me"? You might as well, when
the storm came down this morning, have said, "Storm, cease to
fall;" as say, when doubt and fear and apprehensions of God's
anger come down upon your soul, "Hailstones, beat upon me no
more."

And what can you do against afflictions—afflictions in body, in

family, or in circumstances? Can you bear them with a patient
resignation, and say, "I can endure anything or everything"? Who
can bear one affliction in his own strength? Can you bear your
little finger to ache? Can you bear a sharp toothache, half-an-
hour of tic douloureux, or a night's ear-ache? Can you bear to see
a dear child suffer? Can you endure the frowning face of God in
providence? Are you never chafed? Is not your mind cast down,
and does not the rebellious wave sometimes flow over your
breast?
When professors speak against you, and cast out your name as
evil, can you always bear it? Can you put your mouth in the dust?
When one cheek is smitten, can you always turn the other? O you
must be made of different material from Adam's fallen race; you
cannot have the same heart that beats in the bosom of him that
speaks to you, if you can always be patient and resigned; always
believe, and hope, and love; always be calm and unruffled; are
never tempted, never slip, and never backslide. Surely, surely,
you are not yet perfect in the flesh, nor out of the reach of
gunshot.

2. "Neither know we what to do." That seems worse still. Know

not what to do! To be in such perplexity as not to know how to
act! If a man were to say, "I am very weak, but I have a plan in
my head which I am sure will succeed; or, although I cannot do
the thing myself, yet I have a friend that can;" such a person we
should not consider without resource of some kind. He could not
with truth say, "I know not what to do." To have no strength is to
be very low; but to have no wisdom is to be lower still.

Now when a "great company" comes against you, do you always

or often know "what to do"? Is there a treasure of wisdom in your
heart? Can you take inward counsel, and say, "I see how I can
manage this; I can easily overcome that; I have a plan for this
difficulty, and a contrivance for that annoying circumstance. It
does not therefore much matter what trial comes, I know exactly
how to meet it"? If you are there, you are not in the experience
of Jehoshaphat, and the people for whom he was interceding with
the Lord. He was compelled to confess for himself and them what
many a poor child of God has said in substance, if not in word,
"We know not what to do!" We are fairly brought to our wits' end,
and are altogether baffled and confounded.

Apply this experimentally to your own case. When afflictions

come, do you know what to do? You may have heavy losses in
providence. Can you always meet the trial with calmness and
resignation, and say, "Well, to be sure, it is rather a loss, but
then it does not much signify"? A man who can talk so, does not
know much about the matter. Apathy is not submission, though
one of that spurious brood that often walk abroad under Christian
surnames. This is the trying point, not to "know what to do"; not
to see what way to take, nor be able by any contrivances of our
own skill or wisdom to meet the difficulty.

Again, when your lusts and passions are stirred up—and I

suppose sometimes they move, they do not always lie calm and
dead in your soul—you find now and then a little working of the
old Adam nature; sin is not always taking its nap, nor torpid like
a snake in winter. I suppose that now and then there is
something not altogether spiritual or gracious, some sensual
desire, some pride, some base imagination at work in your carnal
mind. O be assured there is a veil of unbelief on your heart if you
do not see, and your conscience is not very tender if you do not
feel it. But when your old Adam nature is stirred up, do you know
what to do? "O, yes," say you, "I do; I am at no loss or standstill
whatever. Directly I find sin stir, I make a firm resolution that I
will not be overcome by it. I never give way to pride,
covetousness, worldly-mindedness, evil tempers, or any of the
works of the flesh." I really cannot believe you. You may make
resolutions; but how long or how often do you keep them? Is it
not as long as a little child keeps its resolutions to be good? When
the parent is about to punish it, O what resolutions it makes! The
tears run down its little cheeks; it will promise almost anything to
avoid punishment: "I will never do it again, I will never do it
again; I will be so good, so good." How long? how long? Perhaps
not half-an-hour. And thus our resolutions, if we make them, are
not much better than the promises of a child. I have long given
over making any. But if we are so foolish as to make resolutions,
how long will they last? Just as long as a feather lies quiet upon
the roof of a house; it only waits for the first puff of wind, and
then it is gone. And so our resolutions are like feathers; the first
puff blows them to the winds.

And how can you manage your doubts and fears? Do you take
them by the neck and strangle them? Can you put your hand
down into your heart and cast them out like a nest of vipers? You
will be stung in the attempt.

The real cry of the soul is, "We know not what to do!" In times
past we thought we knew what to do; we were tolerably strong,
we would pray, would read God's Word, would keep our eyes and
ears and tongues, would set a guard over the movements of the
heart, and perhaps to a certain extent we succeeded. But it was
because we knew little of this "great company." It was a little
company, perhaps; and when it was only a little company, we
might know what to do; but when this "great company" came, it
put the soul to its wits' end, and brought forth the exclamation,
We know not what to do!"

Now, till the soul is more or less brought here, it knows very little
of the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ. We must be brought into
trying places to know anything of God. I have often thought of
poor McKenzie's words, and striking words they were, in his last
illness. When the blood was gushing from his mouth, he said, "It
is here we want a God!" Aye, it is here we want a God; but very
often, too often, we do not want a God. Am I going too far when I
say that nine-tenths of our time, perhaps, we can do without a
God? Take this day. You have been engaged in your business, in
your lawful occupations. Have you not been doing the greater
part of this day perhaps without God? Have you in many hours,
many quarter-hours, many minutes this day, really felt your need
of a God, really wanted God; feeling in that state and case that
you wanted a present God, a God to help, a God to bless, a God
to appear, a God to come down into your soul? I do not mean
that there has been no aching void, no looking upward, no secret
prayer or supplication; but not such extreme desires and earnest
cries as if you needed Him in a special manner. Base creatures
are we with all our profession, that we can do so much and so
often without a present God; that we keep Him, so to speak at a
distance; pay him compliments, and yet can do for the most part
so much without Him.

But when brought into trying circumstances, then it is we begin

to want a God, and such a God as is the God and Father of the
Lord Jesus Christ, such a God as alone can bless and comfort the
soul.

III. Now under these circumstances does Jehoshaphat plead with

God. And how tenderly and affectionately does he plead! If you
will read what precedes our text, you will see how he pleads with
God, and chiefly on three grounds. He pleads with Him first on
the ground of His power and might: "Is there not all power with
Thee?" He pleads with Him secondly on the ground of His
covenant: "Art not Thou our God?" He pleads with Him thirdly on
the ground of His dwelling with them in the sanctuary: "And they
dwell therein, and have built Thee a sanctuary therein for Thy
name, saying, If when evil cometh upon us, as the sword,
judgment, or pestilence, or famine, we stand before this house,
and in Thy presence (for Thy name is in this house), and cry unto
Thee in our affliction, then Thou wilt hear and help." By the
"sanctuary" we may understand the human nature of the Lord
Jesus Christ, that sanctuary and true tabernacle which the Lord
pitched and not man. He comes therefore to God with these three
powerful pleas: as a God of great strength, and therefore able; a
God in covenant, and therefore willing; and a God in Christ, and
therefore loving and merciful. These three powerful pleas he
brings, and lays them at His sacred feet, interceding with Him to
do that for them which they could not do for themselves: "Wilt
Thou not judge them?"

There is something, to my mind, very striking and suitable in this

expression: "Wilt Thou not judge them?" It is as though he put
himself, so to speak, into close communication with God, and
identified Judah's cause with the cause of God; so that God in
delivering her was actually fighting His own battles; and as a
judge upon His judgment seat, was passing a judgment upon His
own enemies.

Now this is the most prevailing plea we can make with God; when
we can look up to Him as our God in covenant, and take our
enemies, our temptations, our afflictions, our doubts, our
exercises, so to speak, into our hand, as so many enemies to
God, and ask the Lord to pass a sentence upon them, not
because they are our enemies, but because they are His. We may
perhaps thus illustrate it. In war time there is in the garrison a
traitor who is conspiring to betray the fortress. A soldier detects
the wretch; he seizes him upon the spot, brings him to the
general, and denounces his crime. Now when the soldier arrests
the traitor, he does not arrest him as his enemy, but as the
enemy of his sovereign. So, if we can arrest our lusts and base
passions, seize them as traitors, bring them before God, and say,
"These are Thy enemies; do Thou judge them and punish them,
and for Thy name's sake deliver us from their treachery;" this
seems, as it were, to put God upon our side, and to call in His
justice to execute judgment upon them as His enemies.

There is no use fighting the battle in our own strength. We have

none. There is no use when sin has made a breach in the
conscience to thrust into the gap a stout faggot of self-
righteousness. The weapons of our warfare are not carnal, but
spiritual. The strength of Christ, the blood of Christ, the grace of
the gospel, the sword of the Spirit—these must be our weapons.
"They overcame by the blood of the Lamb, and by the word of
their testimony." But how few fight with these weapons! How
many take their self-righteousness as a weapon against their
sins; and thus they only fight flesh with flesh; they only combat
self in one form by self in another form. This is popery. Poor weak
creatures go into convents and monasteries. For what? To fight
against sin. By what? By self-righteousness. They macerate their
bodies, wear sackcloth, repeat their prayers, and attend to their
ceremonies. For what purpose? To subdue their sins, arming flesh
against flesh. And what is the consequence? If they have any
conscience at all, they are crushed down in this ineffectual
struggle, as Luther was in his cell at Erfurt. This is popery in full
blossom—a gaudy flower, of which Protestant self-righteousness
is a swelling bud. The essence of popery is creature
righteousness, and to fight against sin by self-righteousness is
next door to going into a monastery, wearing a hair shirt, or
flagellating the shoulders with a scourge. The gospel has brought
to light a better, a more effectual way. "Wilt Thou not judge
them?" "Here are my lusts, I cannot manage them; here are my
temptations, I cannot overcome them; here are my doubts and
fears, I cannot subdue them; here are my enemies, I cannot
conquer them. Lord, I know not what to do. But wilt Thou not
judge them? Wilt not Thou manage for me? Wilt Thou not subdue
mine enemies and Thine?" This is, so to speak, taking these lusts
and passions by the neck, and laying them down at the feet of
God as God's enemies, and thus bringing the power of God
against them, setting in array the omnipotence of Jehovah
against what would otherwise destroy us. This is prevailing. To
fight thus under the banner of the Lord is to make head against
sin; but to fight against it in our own resolution and strength is
only to fall its victim. This is taking the weapons of God to fight
against our spiritual foes; and these weapons are not carnal, but
mighty through God to the pulling down of strongholds. This is
fighting against sin, not in the flesh, but in the Spirit; not by the
law, but by the gospel; not by self, but by the grace of God. And
if your soul has had many a tussle, and many a wrestle, and
many a hand-to-hand conflict with sin, you will have found this
out before now, that nothing but the grace, power, and Spirit of
Christ ever gave you the victory, or the least hope of victory.

IV. "But our eyes are upon Thee." Jehoshaphat did not know what
to do; he was altogether at his wits' end; and yet he took the
wisest course a man could take. This is the beauty of it, that
when we are fools, then we are wise; when we are weak, then we
are strong; when we know not what to do, then we do the only
right thing. O had Jehoshaphat taken any other course; had he
collected an army, sent through Judah, raised troops and forged
swords and spears, he would certainly have been defeated. But
not knowing what to do, he did the very thing he should do: "Our
eyes are upon Thee." "Thou must fight our battles; Thou must
take the matter into Thy own hands. Our eyes are upon Thee,
waiting upon Thee, looking up, and hoping in Thee, believing in
Thy holy Name, expecting help from Thee, from whom alone help
can come." But this is painful work to be brought to this point,
"our eyes are upon Thee," implying there is no use looking to any
other quarter. It assumes that the soul has looked, and looked,
and looked elsewhere in vain, and then fixed its eyes upon God
as knowing that from Him alone all help must come. This I
believe to be the distinctive mark of a Christian, that his eyes are
upon God. On his bed by night, in his room by day, in business or
at market, when his soul is in trouble, cast down, and perplexed,
his eyes are upon God. From Him alone all help must come; none
else can reach his case. All other but the help of God is
ineffectual; it leaves him where it found him, it does him no good.
We are never safe except our eyes are upon God. Let our eyes be
upon Him, we can walk safely; let our eyes be upon the creature,
we are pretty sure to slip and stumble.

"Our eyes are upon Thee." And O, how simple, suitable,

complete, and blessed a remedy is this, when the Lord is pleased
to open our eyes, and fix them on Himself. He must do it all. If
the eyes are to be upon Him, He must first give us eyes; if lifted
upon Him, He must raise them upwards; if kept upon Him, He
must hold them waking. It is good to be in this spot. There are
times and seasons, perhaps, when we seem to have no religion
whatever; when we look, and look, and look, and cannot find a
grain. Where is our spirituality? Where our heavenly affections?
Where our prayerfulness of spirit? Where our tenderness of
conscience? Where our godly fear? Where our meditations upon
God's Word? We look, and look, and look; they seem gone. Now
perhaps, in the midst of this uncertainty we are brought into
some painful exercise, some affliction, some temptation, some
apprehension, something that lies with weight and power upon
the soul. Now is the time we want our religion. But it is gone, it is
gone, leaving us empty, needy, naked, and bare; religion, as
regards its blessedness and comfort, we seem to have none. This
is emptying work; this is stripping the soul, as it were, to the very
bone. But what a preparation to receive the religion which is from
above! How the vessel must be emptied of the dirty water of
creature religion, well rinsed, and washed out, to have the pure
water of heavenly religion communicated from the divine
fountain. God never mingles the pure stream of heavenly religion
with the dirty, filthy water of our own creature religion. We must
be emptied of every drop, so to speak, of our natural religion, to
have the holy and spiritual religion, which is from above, poured
into the soul. But to look, and look, and look, and find nothing
but emptiness, nakedness, barrenness, and destitution; to have a
"great company" of enemies all coming against us, and we as
weak as water; what an emptying for divine filling, what a
stripping for divine clothing, and what a bringing down of self for
the raising up of Christ! True religion consists mainly in two
points: to be emptied, stripped, made naked and bare; and then
to be clothed and filled out of Christ's fulness.

Thus, of all people the children of God are the weakest, and yet
they are the only persons really strong; of all they are the most
ignorant, yet they are the only wise; of all the most helpless, and
yet they alone are effectually helped; of all the most hobbling,
yet they alone have a good hope through God; of all perhaps in
their feelings the most unbelieving, and yet are partakers, and
they alone, of the grace of faith. "Great is the mystery of
godliness;" a paradox is the life of a Christian; a mysterious path
he is called upon to tread; and he can rightly learn it in the school
of experience alone. By a series of lessons in the school of Christ
the people of God have their religion burnt into their souls; and
what they thus learn becomes a part of themselves. It is not lost
on the road from chapel, nor left behind in the pew, nor shut up
in the hymnbook till the following Sunday, nor dropped at the
street-door. It is not a passing notion, nor an empty name, nor
towering smoke, nor earth-born vapour; but a divine reality
lodged by the hand of God Himself in the heart, which will shine
more and more to the perfect day. Be not then discouraged, if the
Lord is leading any of you in this path; say not, "a strange thing
has happened unto you;" things you little thought of in times
gone by. Does not the Lord lead the blind by a way they knew
not? And in paths they have not seen? Does He not make crooked
things straight before them, and rough places plain? Is not God in
Christ alone to be our King, our Leader, our Help, our Hope, our
All? It is a mercy to have something of the teaching of God in the
soul, if it be only to empty it, at present no further than to strip
and lay low; to take away every false covering, to bring down
into the dust of self-abasement, with the eyes upon the Lord,
looking for and expecting a revelation of His mercy and love.

There are few who have got so far as this. There are few,
comparatively speaking, who know they are nothing; few who are
low enough for Christ to stoop down to; few who feel they are
fallen among thieves, and want the good Samaritan to pass by
and pour oil and wine into their wounds. There are very few who
have got so far as to know their own sickness and their own sore.
Yet would we hope there are those here whom the Lord is leading
down into the valley; and though they are perhaps writing bitter
things against themselves, their names are written in the Lamb's
book of life. It is the poor and needy whom the Lord has respect
unto, and those that humble themselves in God's own time and
way shall be blessedly exalted.
A BELIEVER’S COLLOQUY WITH HIS SOUL

Preached at Gower Street Chapel, London, on Lord’s Day

Evening, 19th July 1868.

"Why art thou cast down, O my soul? and why art thou disquieted
within me? hope thou in God; for I shall yet praise him, who is
the health of my countenance, and my God." Psalm 42:11

What a proof it is of the truth and inspiration of the word of God,

that no sooner is the Lord pleased to quicken our souls into
spiritual life, than we find the Bible to become our companion,
counsellor, and friend. True, we might possibly before that time,
from a sense of duty or out of custom, have read the Scriptures,
and that diligently. We might have been taught them from
childhood, and committed large portions to memory; or even
have been able so far to understand them as to speak fluently
upon the truths contained in them, and contend for the doctrines
of grace against opponents. But though we might have done all
this, and much more than this, for who can say how far nature
may go?—yet for the most part, how listlessly and languidly was
the word of God read by us; how little was its spiritual meaning
understood; how much less were the solemn realities revealed in
it believed or acted upon.

We might not have doubted the inspiration of the Bible, and

might have regarded it with a degree of reverence as the word of
God; but with all that outward respect, there was no real faith in
our heart either to fear the threatenings, or to receive the
promises. We never obtained through it any well-grounded hope
in the mercy of God; we never felt from it any spiritual love to his
name, or to any truth connected with the Person and work of
Christ. Nor did it ever work in us any humility of mind,
brokenness of heart, contrition of spirit, or any obedience to
God’s will, or create any earnest desire to please or solemn fear
to offend him. And thus, as regards what the word of God was to
us, as to any saving or sanctifying effect upon our hearts or upon
our lives, it was a perfect blank to us, and we as great a blank to
it.

But O what a change takes place in the soul’s feelings towards

the word of God when God is pleased to quicken it into divine life!
Nor indeed need we wonder why there is such a marked
revolution in our feelings toward it; for it is by the power of God’s
word upon the heart, that this wondrous change is effected. "Of
his own will begat he us with the word of truth, that we should be
a kind of firstfruits of his creatures." (James 1:18) "Being born
again, not of corruptible seed, but of incorruptible, by the word of
God, which liveth and abideth for ever." (1 Pet. 1:23) "This is my
comfort in my affliction: for thy word hath quickened me." (Ps.
119:50) By that same word we were convinced of our sins; "For
the word of God is quick, and powerful, and sharper than any
two-edged sword, piercing even to the dividing asunder of soul
and spirit, and of the joints and marrow, and is a discerner of the
thoughts and intents of the heart." (Heb. 4:12) By the power of
that word also upon our consciences, we were, in due time,
enabled to believe in the Son of God; for it is through his word
applied to the heart with a divine power, that faith is raised up to
believe in his name; and then it is, as the Lord said to his
disciples, "The words that I speak unto you, they are spirit and
they are life." (John 6:63) And this spirit and life are the spirit
and life of faith, and specially of that faith which embraces Him as
the Son of God; for when he is pleased to apply his precious word
to the heart, and in the power of that word to manifest himself,
faith is raised up to receive his testimony, and thus his word is
made Spirit and life to the soul. This made Jeremiah say: "Thy
words were found, and I did eat them; and thy word was unto me
the joy and rejoicing of mine heart." (Jer. 15:16) In a similar
way, when the soul is cast down by reason of the many
difficulties of the way, that word becomes its support. "My soul
fainteth for thy salvation: but I hope in thy word." (Ps. 119:81)
When we are in difficulties or perplexities, that word becomes our
counselor; as David found it: "Thy testimonies also are my
delight and my counselors." (Ps. 119:24) And again, "Thy word is
a lamp unto my feet, and a light unto my path." (Ps. 119:105)
And the counsel it gives us is good counsel, for it tells us how to
act and what to do: bids us cast our care upon the Lord, for that
he will sustain us; bids us be still and know that He is God; warns
us not to fight our own battles, or go forth to meet the enemy in
our own strength; but to watch, and pray, and wait for the Lord
to appear.

If we are persecuted by our enemies as David was by Saul, when

he was hunted like a partridge upon the mountains, it is by the
power and support of that word we get strength to bear their
cruel accusations and to stand firm against their attacks. This
made David say, "They had almost consumed me upon earth: but
I forsook not thy precepts." (Ps. 119:87) If Satan come in like a
flood, the Spirit of the Lord by the power of his word lifts up a
standard against him. If we slip and start aside from the strait
and narrow way, the word comes to restore us: "He restoreth my
soul." (Ps. 23:3) for it is by believing God’s promise of freely
forgiving all iniquity, transgression, and sin, that our backslidings
are healed and our souls brought back from bondage, carnality,
and death. In fact it is by the power of his word upon our heart,
that the whole work of grace upon the soul is carried on from first
to last. By its promises we are drawn, by its precepts we are
guided, by its warnings we are admonished, by its reproofs we
are rebuked, by its rod we are chastened, by its support we are
upheld; in its light we walk, by its teachings are made wise, by its
revivings are renewed, and by its truth are sanctified. Not that
the word of God can of itself do all or any of these things in us
and for us; but in the hands of the Spirit, who works in and by it
as his effectual instrument, all these gracious operations are
carried on in the soul.

Now can we say this, or anything similar to this, of any other

book? Other books may instruct or amuse: they may feed the
intellect, charm the imagination, and cultivate the mind. But what
more can they do? I do not mean by this to despise or set aside
every other book but the Bible; for without books society itself, as
at present constituted, could not exist; and to burn every book
would be to throw us back into the barbarism of the Middle Ages.
Let, then, books have their place as regards this life: but what
can they do far us as regards the life to come? What can our
renowned authors, our choice classics, our learned historians, our
great dramatists, or our eloquent poets do for the soul in seasons
of affliction and distress? Can they heal a wounded conscience?
Can they put away a sense of God’s wrath? Can they restore the
joys of salvation, when, through guilt and fear, they seem well
nigh gone? Can they support a dying man upon his bed of
sickness? Can they take away the sting of death and snatch
victory from the grave? How powerless all human writings are in
these circumstances. Is it not as Mr. Hart well says?

What balm could wretches ever find

In wit, to heal affliction?
Or who can cure a troubled mind
With all the pomp of diction?

Now here is the blessedness of the word of God, that when

everything else fails, that comes to our aid under all
circumstances, so that we never can sink so low as to get beyond
the reach of some promise in the word of truth. We may come,
and most probably shall come, to a spot where everything else
will fail and give way but the word of God which for ever is settled
in heaven. Then the word of grace and truth which reaches down
to the lowest case, the word of promise upon which the Lord
causes the soul to hope, will still turn towards us a friendly smile,
and still encourage us under all circumstances to call upon the
name of the Lord, and to hang upon his faithfulness who hath
said, "Heaven and earth shall pass away, but my words shall not
pass away." (Mark 13:31) Thus, under circumstances the most
trying to flesh and blood, where nature stands aghast and reason
fails, there the word of God will come in as a counsellor to drop in
friendly advice, as a companion to cheer and support the mind by
its tender sympathy, and as a friend to speak to the heart with a
loving, affectionate voice. We need not wonder, then, how the
word of God has been prized in all ages by the family of God; for
it is written with such infinite wisdom, that it meets every case,
suits every circumstance, fills up every aching void, and is
adapted to every condition of life and every state both of body
and soul.

These thoughts spring up in my mind in connection with my text.

What that connection is may perhaps be more evident as I unfold
it; but is not this a wonderful circumstance, that if your soul is
cast down within you and your mind disquieted, and yet you are
hoping in God and expecting him to appear, you have a
companion in the word of God; and that our text assures you that
there was one before you walking in the same path, and in whose
heart the Spirit of God wrought feelings and desires similar to
yours? Let us, then, see whether, as you compare the things that
you pass through with the word of truth, you will not find a
reflection of your experience, and an echo of your voice in the
words of the Psalmist now before us.

We see in them a pathetic colloquy which David carries on with

his soul; and that from this colloquy he gathers up hope and
encouragement for himself. I shall, therefore, simply follow the
order in which the words present themselves to our view, and
shall

I. First, address myself to the consideration of David’s pathetic

inquiry to his soul: "Why art thou cast down, O my soul? and
why art thou disquieted within me?"

II. Secondly, I shall consider the encouraging admonition,

which he addresses to his soul as thus cast down and disquieted:
"Hope thou in God."

III Thirdly, the confident expectation, which he gathers up in

this colloquy, that the dark cloud will pass away and the time
come when he shall praise Him who was "the health of his
countenance and his God".

I. Observe the tender and familiar way in which David converses

with his own soul, as a tender and sympathising bosom
companion.
(i) But how few, speaking comparatively, know that they have a
soul which they can thus talk to. Indeed, I may say, that it is
really a very great discovery when a man discovers, for the first
time, that he has a soul in his breast. The great bulk of mankind,
may we not indeed say, all who are destitute of divine life, do not
really and truly know that they have a soul. This may seem harsh
doctrine, but at any rate they act as if they had none. In fact, a
man never really and truly discovers that he has a soul till he
discovers that there is a God, nor does he ever discover that
there is a God until a ray of divine light shines out of the fullness
of God into his heart. I do not mean to say that men actually in
so many words deny either the existence of the soul or the
existence of God. But we must judge men from their actions; and
if they act as if they had no soul to be saved or lost, and as if
there were no God who would bring them into judgment, we must
conclude that they do not believe either in heart, though they
may not boldly and positively deny it in lip.

But a man never knows really and truly that he has a soul till
there is life put into it; for a dead soul makes no movement in his
breast, and is therefore not known to be there. It is like a
stillborn child, which gives no sign or movement of life, and
therefore is to its mother as if it were not. We need not wonder
the child does not cry if it be dead; we need not marvel it does
not move a limb if stillborn. How does the child make its
existence known but by the cry and the movements of life? Thus
it is in grace: we never know really that we have a soul till it is
made alive unto God and cries unto him. Then we begin find for
the first time, that we have a soul by the cry of life; and then our
soul becomes a matter of the deepest interest to us; for we find
that, according to the word of God, it must either be eternally
saved or lost; and as we cannot separate enduring happiness or
misery from the soul which is the seat of both, it becomes to us
the most important thing that we have ever had to deal with. This
brings us into an intimacy and a sympathy with it.
O what a tender part of a man his soul is, when God has put life
and feeling into it; what a valuable part, in fact, the only valuable
part, for it alone can never perish, it alone is the immortal part of
man. Being, then, so tender and so valuable, lying so deeply
hidden in the breast, and yet ever present and ever ready to
speak and be spoken unto, an intimate friendship and a tender
sympathy springs up between a man and his soul. Intimate is the
friendship between brother and brother, between sister and
sister, between friend and friend, and more intimate still between
man and wife. But what is the intimacy, even of man and wife,
the nearest, tenderest, of all relationships, compared with the
intimacy that a man has with his own soul? How a man can talk
to his soul, reason with it, comfort it, chide it, encourage it,
remonstrate with it; and how the soul can talk again with him,
listen to his words, re-echo them and answer them; how,
sometimes, it will give heed to his counsel, at others, obstinately
refuse even lawful comfort; as David speaks, "My soul refused to
be comforted." (Ps. 77:2)

We need not, then, wonder that David and his soul talked
together, both in our text and elsewhere, nor that he should seek
to cheer it up; for if his soul were cast down, he was cast down.
The sorrows of his soul were his sorrows, as the joys of his soul
were his joys; the pangs his soul felt were his pangs, and its
distress was his distress; and felt all the more because it touched
such a tender and valuable part as the dear friend that dwelt in
his breast. Not that I mean to separate a man from his soul, as
though the soul was one thing and his consciousness of having a
soul was another. Nor shall I plunge into the depths of
metaphysics, or bring forward speculative ideas and imaginative
notions. I wish to avoid all such vain ideas and foolish
speculations, and merely take the broad ground that God takes
here in bringing before us the language of David; for he evidently
is set before us in the word of truth as talking with his soul, and
asking it why it is cast down.

But, following out the analogy and carrying on the figure, the soul
may be considered as answering his question; for if David said,
"Why art thou cast down, O my soul?" we may well conceive the
soul may return him some answer, or else there could be no
mutual converse or affectionate and sympathising colloquy
between them. Now, if we may be allowed to listen to what the
soul says, or if I, as an interpreter, may interpret to you its
language, we may conceive it speaking thus: "I will tell thee
David, why I am cast down; for I know that in thee I shall have a
sympathising friend; I will not, therefore, keep back why I am
cast down and why I am disquieted, for it will relieve me and may
help to comfort you."

(ii) I shall, therefore, speaking as it were for the soul, endeavour

to show various causes why it is often cast down and disquieted,
and thus may be able to return some answer to David’s anxious
enquiry, which I will assume is often your own.

"One thing," says the soul, "which casts me down, is guilt upon
the conscience"

The very idea of being cast down is that of a person thrown down
from a high into a low place. Thus the soul had stood in pride and
self-righteousness. It had no knowledge of the majesty or
holiness of God, nor of the demands of his righteous law. But the
entrance of God’s word giving light, and the power of his grace
giving life, the holiness of God is seen and the demands of the
law are felt. Now the effect of this is to cast down the soul from
its vain-confident, hypocritical, presumptuous security; and
nothing casts it down so much as a load of guilt which is thus laid
upon the conscience. I may be addressing myself, even now, to
some individual who at this moment is suffering under distress of
conscience, who knows the burden of guilt, and is cast down
through the recollection of some sin or sins which he has
committed, and the guilt of which has brought him into much
distress and anxiety of mind.

Now, may I not say to such a one, "Why art thou cast down, O
soul? Is there no remedy for thee in this cast-down state? Has
not the Lord Jesus Christ shed his precious blood to put away sin
by the sacrifice of himself? Is there not in him a sufficiency, and
with him, as the Scripture speaks, ‘plenteous redemption?’ Is
there not in His blood an efficacy which cleanseth from all sin,
and in His righteousness a fulfillment of the law, which perfectly
justifies?" "Ah," says the soul, "there is, I know there is. On that
point I am well satisfied. I do not doubt the efficacy of Christ’s
blood and righteousness. But what I want to feel is the
application of that precious blood, the pardon-speaking voice of
the Lord himself, the inward whisper, the sweet testimony, the
gracious assurance, and the word from the Lord’s own lips, that
shall heal my guilty conscience, and pour oil and wine into my
troubled spirit."

But let us hear the soul speaking again; for it has other things
which cast it down: "What casts me down is finding so much
sin working in my carnal mind, and manifesting itself in my
fleshly members to bring forth fruit unto death. O that I could be
holy, walk tenderly in the fear of God, get the better of besetting
sins, never be entangled in, or overcome by, the power of
temptation, so that I might live more as becometh a Christian,
have more of the life and fear of God in my soul, and find less
inward conflict, less opposition, and less evil, with a more
abundant measure of the love of God shed abroad in my heart!"
"Well, cast-down soul, thou art only cast down as most, if not all,
of God’s people have been in all ages, and are at the present
time. It is the body of sin and death that we have to carry about
with us, the depravity of our fallen nature, the lusts and
abominations that lurk and work in our vile imagination, if they
go no further, which give us all this trouble. How many are
continually sighing and mourning because they have so little of
the image of Christ stamped upon them, so little of the holiness
of God made conspicuous in them, so little of that blessed
sanctification of body, soul, and spirit, that we see in the word
and strive after, and yet find so little carried on and carried out in
ourselves."

But the soul speaks again, and says, "What casts me down is the
temptations of Satan, the hurling in of his fiery darts, and the
stirring up of every vile abomination in the depths of my wicked
nature; so that I seem at times to be worse than the devil
himself. Where can the fear of God be in my heart, the life of
Christ in my conscience, or the teaching and testimony of the
Holy Ghost within, to be so subject to these temptations and to
find them so stir up the corruptions of my vile nature?"

But the soul has yet to speak, "O, how long have I been praying
for a manifestation of Christ! How I have seen one after another
delivered from bondage, doubt, and fear; and yet here I am,
after long years of profession, much in the same spot. O I do not
seem to get one step forward in the things of God, or get on as I
see others do! O how my soul longs for a word from the Lord, if it
were but one word; one smile, if it were but one faint smile; one
turning of the Lord’s face toward me; one breaking in of the light
of his countenance; one manifestation of his mercy and love to
my heart; one drop of his blood upon my conscience; one
discovery of him so as to know that he is mine!"

But as the soul is still free to speak, and can almost say with
Elihu, "I will speak that I may be refreshed," (Job 32:20) we will
hear its voice speaking again: "I have great troubles in
Providence, heavy trials in my family, am much exercised in my
business, for all things seem against me, and this casts me down,
for I think God is angry with me, and therefore his hand is gone
out against me."

But let us hear its voice once more, and let it speak it may be for
you, lest you should think yourself left out; "Do what I will, I
cannot be what I would. I try to read the word, but seem
neither to understand nor to believe it; I bend my knee before
the throne, but have little access to the throne of grace; I come
to hear, and often go away as I came, without any power, life, or
feeling under the word to my heart; I talk to the people of God
and hear them speak how the Lord appears for them here and
there; but my mouth is silent, for I have nothing to tell them in
return."
(iii) But what is the effect of the soul being, in these various
ways, cast down? Disquiet. For David says, still addressing his
soul, "And why art thou disquieted within me?" "O," the soul
says, "there is no rest in my bosom! I cannot get that solid peace
which I am looking for, and which Christ has promised he will
give to his disciples as his own peace, his abiding legacy. But
instead of feeling sweet peace, a holy calm of mind, producing
submission to the will of God, reconciling me to the path of
affliction, bowing my back to every chastening stroke, making me
to rejoice even in tribulation, and conforming me to the suffering
image of Christ; instead of this, I find rebellion, restlessness,
disquietude, so as rarely to know a moment’s solid rest or
peace."

Somewhat in this way, then, in answer to the question, "Why art

thou disquieted within me?" we may suppose the soul to say, "I
have told you the things that cast me down; do they not afford
sufficient reason to explain why I am disquieted within me?"

But let me now apply this more particularly to your case. Does
not all this disquietude teach you that there is no solid rest nor
peace except in the Lord?, Out of him all is disquiet, confusion,
restlessness, and uneasiness. Now it is life within which makes us
feel all this; and therefore, if you, or any of you, are thus cast
down and your soul is thus disquieted within you, do not think
you are traveling a path unknown to the family of God, or that
yours is a solitary case. Depend upon it, you have many
companions in this road besides the companionship of your own
soul. And do you not see, that David traveled in the same path
before you, and that God has left upon record the exercises of his
soul, that they might encourage others who are similarly dealt
with? Why should David have talked the matter over with his soul
ages ago; and why should the Holy Ghost have left upon
permanent record his conversation with his bosom friend? Why
should he have removed the veil, which at the time hung over
David’s inmost thoughts and feelings, and brought to light his
secret communing with his bosom friend, except to cheer,
comfort, and encourage those who should afterwards travel by
the same path?

II.—But this brings us to the next point, in which I proposed to

show how David admonished and encouraged his cast-down
and disquieted soul: "Hope thou in God".

It is as if he had said, "Well, soul, thou hast told me thy mournful

ale; thou has breathed thy sorrowful complaints in my ear;" I
know all that concerneth thee; for there is not a secret pain which
I do not see and feel too. If thou art cast down, so am I; and if
thou art disquieted, I am disquieted with thee; for we are one in
life, death, time, and eternity. And yet, O soul, it is all for thy
benefit. Listen with me to the word of God and see if we cannot
gather up thence some strength and support. Let me, then, give
thee a word of exhortation, that thou shouldst not be so cast
down or disquieted as to renounce thy hope. Satan would gladly,
if he could, drive thee to the borders of despair; he would soon
rob thee of every grain of hope, and fill thee with his own misery.
But O my soul, thou must not listen to the enemy’s subtle
temptations, nor even to thine own distressing fears; for, by so
doing, thou rather sidest with Satan than resistest him.

If cast down, remember this, that to be cast down, is not to be

cast away. For his own wise purposes; God often suffers his
people to be cast down; but he never casts them away. Has he
not promised, "I will never leave thee nor forsake thee?" (Heb.
13:5) Has he not said, "I have engraven thee on the palms of my
hands; thy walls are continually before me?" (Isai. 49:16) It is
expressly declared: "The Lord will not cast off his people, neither
will he forsake his inheritance." (Ps. 94:14) We may doubt and
fear, and even say with David in the very Psalm before us, "Why
dost thou cast me off?" or even plead with him, "O God, why hast
thou cast us off for ever?" The Lord still answers: "I will not cast
them away, neither will I abhor them, to destroy them utterly,
and to break my covenant with them; for I am the Lord their
God." (Lev. 26:44)
Thou mayest be disquieted and have many reasons why sorrow
fills thy heart, but thy very disquietude shows signs of life.
Whence comes thy craving after God, thy panting after him, as
the hart after the water brooks? Are not these the movements of
divine life in thy bosom? Thus, thy very restlessness, like a child’s
disquietude after its mother in her absence, manifests that thou
canst find no rest except in the bosom of the Lord. "Hope thou
then in God." Do not give way to this casting down, as though
thou wert sunk to rise no more; and be not so disquieted as to
give up thy hope: for that is given thee to be thy anchor, sure
and steadfast, to ride out this storm. Nothing is got by
despondency but rebellion or self-pity; and these the Lord will
never approve of or smile upon. Does he not say "The Lord is
good unto them that wait for him, to the soul that seeketh him. It
is good that a man should both hope and quietly wait for the
salvation of the Lord." (Lam. 3:25, 26) And surely if it be good to
hope, it must be bad to despond.

But as, according to our exposition, the soul told David why it
was cast down, so we may in the same way assume David as
giving the soul reasons why it should hope. We may thus listen to
their secret colloquy; and it seems but fair, as we have heard one
side of the question, that we should also hear the other. Let us,
then, listen as if we heard David now speak: "Well, my soul, I
have heard thy melancholy tale. I know it is all true, for I feel
every word of it." But now listen to me, as I have listened to
thee. And as thou hast poured thy mournful complaints into my
ear, see if I can pour some comforting word into thine. As Thou
hast told me that thou art so cast down as not to be able to rise,
and so disquieted that thou canst get no rest, now let me tell
thee how thou mayest, with God’s help and blessing, stand upon
thy feet and get rest and peace. I will not set thee a hard task to
do in thine own strength, nor preach thee a long sermon on
creature ability and the duty of faith. It shall all be summed up in
four words, "Hope thou in God." "Well," the soul may answer,
"that is good advice; for I know by experience a little of the
cheering sensations of hope; but must there not be some ground
of my hope? for at present my eyes are so dim that I can scarcely
see any," But David answers, "Let me, then see for thee, O soul,
and, like Jethro in the wilderness to the children of Israel, be to
thee ‘as eyes.’" I think I can give thee some good ground for thee
to hope; and this shall be the first—

(i) That thou art alive. Now, consider who made thee alive, O
soul, which art thus cast down, and when thou wert first thrown
down from thy former standing. Wert thou so cast down in days
past? Was sin thy burden in times gone by? Was thy mind
disquieted for want of the blood of sprinkling, of a revelation of
Christ, of a shedding abroad of God’s love, of a manifestation of
mercy? What, then, has made thee to be disquieted? Thou wert
not always so, but found pleasure and happiness, in the world.
Must it not be, then, because thou hast life within; and if God
gave thee life as his own free gift, if he had compassion upon
thee when thou wert dead in sin and far from him by wicked
works, will he leave thee now when, he has taught thee to fear
his great name, and to worship him in spirit and truth?

He sees it good thou shouldst be cast down. Thou wert getting

very proud, O soul. The world had got hold of thy heart. Thou
wert seeking great things for thyself. Thou wert secretly roving
away from the Lord. The Lord has sent thee these trials and
exercises and allowed these temptations to fall upon thee, to
bring thee down from thy state of false security. Thou wert too
much lifted up in self. The high tree had to come down, that the
low tree might be exalted; the green tree to be dried up, that the
dry tree might be made to flourish. Therefore, O soul, thou
needest not wonder that these dispensations should have come
upon thee in providence or in grace to cast thee down. Rather
bless his name that thou art cast down; for when there is casting
down there will be lifting up. It is a good thing to bear the yoke in
one’s youth: for if never cast down, thou wilt never be exalted.
Write not, therefore, bitter things against thyself, O soul, because
thou I art cast down and disquieted. These are the teachings of
God in thy conscience; and therefore, "Hope thou in God."

(ii) Besides this, O soul, let me give thee another ground of

hope. Has not the Lord appeared for thee in days past? Canst
thou not remember that signal opening in providence when thou
wert so exercised and scarcely knewest how matters would be
with thee, but didst pray to the Lord in thy distress and he
appeared for thee in a very conspicuous way? Hast thou forgotten
all that, O soul? And canst thou not remember when the Lord
applied some promise to thee, when sinking and fainting, and
ready to despair: gave thee power to look and live; power to
believe and find support; so as to receive out of his fullness grace
for grace? Then is he not the same God now as he was then? And
has he not given thee a sure pledge thereby that he can do as
much and more, for thee again now? Should not this encourage
thee to hope?

(iii) But let me give thee another ground on which thou mayest
hope. Dost thou forget, O soul, that the way to heaven is a very
strait and narrow path—too narrow for thee to carry thy sins in
it with thee? Dost thou not know there is a fire to try every man’s
religion, of what sort it is? And canst thou expect never to go into
the furnace in which God has chosen his Zion? If thou art to walk
in the strait and narrow path, must thou meet with no trials and
temptations there? If thou art come out of the world and livest
godly in Christ Jesus, will not the world persecute and hate thee?
Art thou to have a different path from that in which the Lord
Jesus himself has walked before thee? Then hope in God. Do not
cast away thy confidence, which hath great recompense of
reward, but cast thy anchor boldly within the veil, and hope in
God.
If thou wilt foolishly ever be looking at thy miserable self and
seeking to extract some comfort thence, thou wilt be ever
disappointed. Instead then of looking at thyself and at all thy
badness, vileness, sin, guilt, and misery look up and hope in God.
Has he not given us a thousand encouragements to do so? See
his tender pity and compassion for the poor and needy. See what
rivers of mercy, grace, and love are in him. See his all-seeing
eye, ever watching over thee and knowing the worst of thy case
and all thy misgivings. View his all-powerful hand, ever ready to
be stretched out on thy behalf. And now, my soul, when thou
hast taken this view of God by faith, as manifesting himself in his
dear Son, hope thou in him.

But now, leaving for a moment this assumed address of David to

his soul, let me speak in my own language to you who can
sympathise with what I have just laid before you, from a feeling
experience of it. May I not upon this point ask you if you do not
feel the benefit of this advice of David? Have you not proved,
again and again, that when you are enabled to look out of your
sinkings and sorrows, castings down and disquietude, and cast
anchor within the veil, you find a secret and sacred support given
unto you? What does the sailor do when he comes to a lee shore
and the wind is blowing hard and strong upon it, so that in a
short time his ship might be upon the rocks? Does he say, "O I
never shall get over this storm; I shall certainly be shipwrecked?"
What does he do? Why, instead of wringing his hands in
despairing misery, he lets the anchor go, and it at once takes
hold of the ground and holds the ship up in the storm.

Now if ever you have known anything of hoping in God, you have
an anchor on board. God’s own gift to you, and meant not for
ornament, but for use. Indeed, it is by the possession of this
anchor, that the good ship built, owned, and chartered by God is
distinguished from the man-built bark which, concerning faith,
makes shipwreck. Now if you are enabled by the power of God’s
grace to cast your anchor thus within the veil, you will find a
secret strength communicated thereby which will enable you to
ride out, every storm. I am not speaking in the language of free
will, as some might think who cannot distinguish sounds, but of
free grace, the language of solid, spiritual experience, and what
every child of God knows more or less by the teaching and
testimony of the Holy Ghost. Such know what a blessed relief a
good hope through grace gives, when, as an anchor of the soul, it
is cast within the veil.

But I shall return to our colloquy between David and his soul; for
it now begins to receive the word from his lips. The soul, had told
David its complaint, and David, like a wise counselor, had bidden
it hope in God. And now the soul cheered and comforted by his
encouraging word, begins to answer him: "Well, David, I feel
great comfort from your words; for they drop with sweet power
into my inmost spirit; and I do believe you are a true prophet, for
I have a witness within that they are agreeable to the word of
truth, as well as to my own experience."

Now as the soul thus encourages its hope, for there is an

encouraging of faith and hope, as well as a damping of them,
then comes with it a measure of confidence, so that it says,
"Well, after all I believe that I shall praise Him: I begin to feel
almost as if I could bless and praise him now. I feel so lifted up; I
feel the anchor to be so firm, and my heart seems so
strengthened and comforted, that really, David, it is as though I
must begin to bless and praise the Lord already. There I was so
cast down and disquieted, as if nothing could raise me up; but
thy words have come with such sweetness and savour into my
breast, that I do believe I shall yet praise him. And I am sure that
none in heaven or earth, as I often tell him, will have such cause
as I."

Now tell me whether you have not been in this spot sometimes?
You have gone upon your knees so cast down, so tried and
distressed in your mind, almost as if there was not a grain of
hope in your soul; but you have poured out your complaints
before the Lord, and shown him all your troubles: and to your
surprise and astonishment did there not come, almost suddenly,
a sweet movement of life and grace upon your soul? In looking
back to the days gone by, a blessed promise which was once
given you came over the secret depths of your heart and raised
up such a sweet hope, that it seemed as if you must burst out in
blessing and praising the Lord. How these things, in their various
changes, these ups and downs, ins and outs, sinkings and risings,
chilling fears and encouraging hopes, ever keep the life of God
warm and tender, living and stirring, in a man’s breast. By these
alternations of sun and shade, these vicissitudes of summer and
winter, for the Lord has made both, (Ps. 74:17) these storms and
calms, these nights and days, the plant of divine life grows and
thrives in the soul.

What would a river be unless it were ever flowing? What would

the sea itself be unless it were continually agitated by the restless
tide and ever-moving waves? A mass of corruption, giving forth,
instead of healthy exhalations which, distilled in clouds, water the
earth, noxious steams, breathing disease and death. So what
would the soul become if there were no movement of divine life,
no castings down or liftings up, no mourning or rejoicing, no
hopes or fears? What would it be? A stagnant pool, in which there
would be nothing but a mass of weeds and rank vegetation; like a
village pond mantled over with duck-weed. But these castings
down, this disquietude, these movements of God upon the spirit,
these various exercises, trials, and temptations, keep the soul
sweet, preserve it from becoming stagnant and stinking, and
maintain the life of God in its vigour and purity.

There is reason, therefore even to praise God for being cast

down, for being disquieted. How it opens up parts of God’s word
which you never read before with any feeling. How it gives you
sympathy and communion with the tried, exercised children of
God. How it weans and separates you from dead professors. How
it brings you in heart and affection out of the world that lieth in
wickedness. And how it engages your thoughts, time after time,
upon the solemn matters of eternity, instead of being a prey to
every idle thought and imagination, and tossed up and down
upon a sea of vanity and folly. But, above all, when there is a
sweet response from the Lord, and the power of divine things is
inwardly felt, in enabling us to hope in God, and looking forward
to praise his blessed name, then we see the benefit of being cast
down and so repeatedly and continually disquieted.

III.—But I shall pass on to David’s confident expectation: "For

I shall yet praise him, who is the health of my countenance, and
my God."
These sudden turns as we may call them, from the lowest
despondency to the highest confidence, from the depths of
disquietude to the fullest assurance, are very frequent in the
Psalms. And perhaps the very history of David’s life, with such
sudden and marked alternations of adversity and prosperity in
providence, may help to account for a similar experience in grace.
But be it so or not, the fact is plain, that a distinguishing feature
in David’s experience was the sudden changes which came over
his soul.

But you will observe, that in his confidence, he is rather looking

forward to the future than enjoying it at the present. And is not
this the very nature of hope? "Hope that is seen," says the
Apostle, "is not hope; for what a man seeth, why doth he yet
hope for?" (Rom. 8:24) Though not yet fully blessed or delivered,
he therefore looked forward in faith and hope to the time when
he should be so, and be enabled to praise God. He could not do it
then; but he firmly believed the time was coming when he both
could and would.

But observe, also, the expression, "Who is the health of my

countenance." By this we may understand the restoration of his
soul to the enjoyment of God’s manifested favour and presence,
which always communicates such happiness and peace as
proclaims itself by the very countenance itself. Disease is always
marked in a man’s countenance. No man can have organic, or
even ordinary disease, without his face showing it to the
experienced eye, and even often discovering the very nature of
the complaint itself. "How well you look!" "How ill you look!"
These common expressions show how health and sickness
manifest themselves in a man’s countenance, even to ordinary
observation.

When God is pleased then, to drop his word with power into a
man’s heart, and restore his soul so as to enable him to bless and
praise his holy name, God becomes the health of his
countenance. The former sickliness of his soul manifested itself in
his very face. He could not smile, and sometimes could hardly lift
up his head. Feeling himself such a guilty wretch, it seemed to
him as if everybody could read his sins in his countenance. Full of
doubt and fear, he was often scarcely able to look up before God
and man; and his heavy eye, and drooping eyelid, betrayed the
feelings of his soul. We see how even natural joy bespeaks itself
in the face. How it gives freshness and animation to the cheek
and lustre to the eye; but how much more is this true of spiritual
joy for as that gives inward health of soul, it manifests itself in a
man’s natural countenance, and his happiness overflows as it
were into his eyes, and features, and face.

But we may take the words as applicable to a man’s spiritual

countenance; for your soul, like your body, has its diseases that
cast a sickly hue over its face. Sometimes your soul is very sick,
languid, and feeble, unable to take any exercise, almost loathing
food, and much deprived of rest. Now this will soon begin to tell
upon your soul’s countenance. Spiritual eyes can read it in your
appearance, spiritual ears hear it in your prayers and
lamentations, spiritual hearts can feel it and sympathise with you,
as knowing themselves what it is to be similarly afflicted. And you
yourselves, as knowing so intimately what is the matter with your
own soul, need no one to tell you that it is in a sickly state; that
you are not as you were in time past, full of life and vigour in the
things of God, but have got into a languishing, unhealthy
condition. Now, this casts you down and makes you disquieted.

But by and by, when a healing word comes, it removes this

sickness out of your soul; it brings, as the Lord promises, "health
and cure;" and the soul once more begins to walk with life and
vigour in the ways of God. Being thus renewed and revived, it
reads and understands the word of God with more life and
feeling; hears it with more savour, unction, and power; knows
more of sweet access to the throne of grace, and enjoys the
things of God more experimentally and believingly. It is in this
way, that God is the health of our countenance; for it is his grace
and his blessing that gives health to the sickly soul. He therefore
said of himself, "I am the Lord that healeth thee." (Ex. 15:26)
And David well knew this, when he said: "Bless the Lord, O my
soul, and forget not all his benefits: who forgiveth all thine
iniquities; who healeth all thy diseases." (Ps. 103:2, 3) A healthy
soul is a greater blessing than a healthy body. Perhaps, the
greatest of all temporal troubles, is an unhealthy body; and the
worst of all spiritual troubles, is an unhealthy soul. And
conversely, the greatest of temporal mercies is a healthy body,
and the greatest of spiritual mercies is a healthy soul.

And then come those few and simple words which crown all, "And
my God." What, when you have been so cast down, when so
disquieted, when so ready to abandon all hope—what, will you
ever be able to say, "My God?" Yes, for he is your God when cast
down and disquieted; your God when you could scarcely feel any
persuasion of interest in his love; your God in all the changing
scenes through which you have passed; and your God so as
never to leave or forsake you for his name’s sake. How this sums
up every thing, "My God;" for if he is your God, all he has and all
he is yours.

Now, what mercies these are to embrace, and what blessings

these are to enjoy. May I not well say: "O what is all that earth
calls good and great, compared with being able to believe that
God is your God; your God in life, your God in death; your God in
time, and your God in eternity! O this is a religion that will do to
live and die by; for if you only have God for the health of your
countenance, and the Holy Ghost seals that home with power
upon your heart, have you not every reason to praise God, even
now, for every dispensation of his providence and grace, and
every ground of confident expectation that you will for ever bless
him when time itself shall be no more?"

Dialogue between a Believer and his Soul.—Psalm 42:11

Believer:
COME, my soul, and let us try,
For a little season,
Every burden to lay by;
Come, and let us reason.
 What is this that casts thee down?
Who are those that grieve thee?
Speak, and let the worst be known;
Speaking may relieve thee.

Soul:
O, I sink beneath the load
Of my nature’s evil!
Full of enmity to God;
Captived by the devil;
Restless as the troubled seas;
Feeble, faint, and fearful;
Plagued with every sore disease;
How can I be cheerful?

Believer:
Think on what thy Saviour bore
In the gloomy garden.
Sweating blood at every pore,
To procure thy pardon!
See him stretched upon the wood,
Bleeding, grieving, crying,
Suffering all the wrath of God,
Groaning, gasping, dying!

Soul:
This by faith I sometimes view,
And those views relieve me;
But my sins return anew;
These are they that grieve me.
O, I’m leprous, stinking, foul,
Quite throughout infected;
Have not I, if any soul,
Cause to be dejected?

Believer:
Think how loud thy dying Lord
Cried out, "It is finished!"
Treasure up that sacred word,
Whole and undiminished;
Doubt not he will carry on,
To its full perfection,
That good work he has begun;
Why, then, this dejection?

Soul:
Faith when void of works is dead;
This the Scriptures witness;
And what works have I to plead,
Who am all unfitness?
All my powers are depraved,
Blind, perverse, and filthy;
If from death I’m fully saved,
Why am I not healthy?

Believer:
Pore not on thyself too long,
Lest it sink thee lower;
Look to Jesus, kind as strong
Mercy joined with power;
Every work that thou must do,
Will thy gracious Saviour
For thee work, and in thee too,
Of his special favour.

Soul:
Jesus’ precious blood, once spilt,
I depend on solely,
To release and clear my guilt;
But I would be holy.

Believer:
He that bought thee on the cross
Fully purge away thy dross;
Make thee a new creature.
Soul:
That he can I nothing doubt,
Be it but his pleasure.

Believer:
Though it be not done throughout,
May it not in measure?

Soul:
When that measure, far from great,
Still shall seem decreasing?

Believer:
Faint not then, but pray and wait,
Never, never ceasing.

Soul:
What when prayer meets no regard?

Believer:
Still repeat it often.

Soul:
But I feel myself so hard.

Believer:
Jesus will thee soften.

Soul:
But my enemies make head.

Believer:
Let them closer drive thee.

Soul:
But I’m cold, I’m dark, I’m dead.

Believer:
Jesus will revive thee.

Joseph Hart (Hymn 780—Gadsby’s selection)

THE BELIEVER'S GAIN HIS LOSS, THE BELIEVER'S
LOSS HIS GAIN

Preached at Eden Street Chapel, Hampstead Road, London, on

Lord's Day Morning, August 24, 1845

"But what things were gain to me, those I counted loss for Christ.
Yea, doubtless, and I count all things but loss for the excellency
of the knowledge of Christ Jesus my Lord: for whom I have
suffered the loss of all things, and do count them but dung, that I
may win Christ, and be found in him not having mine own
righteousness, which is of the law, but that which is through the
faith of Christ, the righteousness which is of God by faith."
Philippians 3:7-9

There are two instances of sovereign grace which shine forth in

most conspicuous lustre in the New Testament. One is, the
conversion of the thief on the cross: and the other, the call by
grace and the call to the ministry, of Saul of Tarsus. I do not
mean to say that every call of the Spirit is not a manifestation of
sovereign grace. I do not wish to imply that one heart is a whit
better than another; or that one man is more an instance of
sovereign grace than another man. But there were circumstances
that surrounded the call of these two men, which heightened, if
heightened it can be, the superaboundings of sovereign grace.
And the Lord, by these two men, seems to have given us two
instances—one, of human nature in its worst form, and the other,
of human nature in its best form. He has held up to our view man
in the depth of profanity, and man in the height of profession: to
shew, that neither the depth of profanity, nor the height of
profession, is beyond the reach of almighty, distinguishing, and
superabounding grace.

In the thief upon the cross, we see human nature in its worst
light. We behold a malefactor stained with a thousand crimes: we
view him at last brought by a strong hand of the law to suffer
merited punishment: yet we see him quickened and made alive
by sovereign grace, brought to believe in the crucified Lord of life
and glory, and taken by the blessed Lord himself into paradise, to
be for ever with him.

In Saul, we see a pharisee of the pharisees, carrying natural

religion to its greatest height, adorned with everything virtuous,
moral, honourable, and consistent. We see this man, who had
gone as far to the extreme of pharisaism, as the thief had gone to
the extreme of profanity, arrested by the same almighty power,
and brought to the same point—to fall into the dust as a poor
sinner, and be saved by the manifestation to his soul of Christ's
blood and righteousness.

For the instruction and edification of God's people in all time, the
apostle Paul was inspired and directed to leave his experience
upon record. And this experience of the apostle we have under
different phases. In three different places in the Acts of the
Apostles we have his call by grace circumstantially detailed,
accompanied, in his case, with a call to the ministry. In the
seventh chapter of the epistle to the Romans, we have his
experience as a Christian man set forth, as distinct from his
apostleship; there he describes the conflict he had with sin, the
daily struggle betwixt nature and grace, and the power of these
two opposing principles. In the second epistle to the Corinthians,
in various portions scattered up and down, we have his
experience as an apostle—the trials and consolations connected
with his ministry—described. And in the third chapter of the
epistle to the Philippians, and more especially in the passage
before us this morning, we have him in three distinct points of
view—three distinct appearances, or phases, as I may call them.
We have Paul past, Paul present, and what he hoped to be,
or what I may perhaps call Paul future.

In other words, I shall endeavour, if God enable me, to unfold

this passage this morning, by shewing,

I.—What Paul was in the time to which he referred as past.

II.—What Paul is in the time of which he is now speaking. And,

III.—What Paul hoped to be in time to come.

These three distinct features, for the sake of clearness, I shall

endeavor this morning to unfold, as various portions of the
experience of the apostle Paul. And in so doing, I shall try to run
a parallel betwixt your experience and his experience, that you
may see whether the Lord has wrought in your heart and
conscience any measure of that which he wrought in the heart of
Paul.

I.—Our first point will be to look at what the apostle was. This
we may divide into two distinct periods: first, what he was
before the Lord quickened his soul: and secondly, what he was
after he was so quickened.

1. Paul, as I before hinted, seems to have carried natural religion

up to its very height. Do we want an instance of what the flesh is
in its most religious form? in it's brightest shape, distinct from,
and independent of, the grace of God? Do we want to see how far
a profession of religion can be carried out? We have it in the case
of the apostle Paul. What does he say of himself? He is trying to
put down all fleshly confidence; he therefore points out what a
child of God is: "For we are the circumcision, which worship God
in the Spirit, and rejoice in Christ Jesus, and have no confidence
in the flesh."

Every child of God, he says, has three distinct marks stamped

upon him: first, "he worships God in the Spirit;" secondly, "he
rejoices in Christ Jesus;" and thirdly, "he has no confidence in the
flesh." But some might answer, 'It is very well for you, Paul, to
talk of having no confidence in the flesh; for you never had
anything to trust to, or boast in.' 'Stop,' replies the apostle, 'if
there be any man in the world who might have had confidence in
the flesh, who might have trusted in natural religion in its
highest, brightest, and best form, I am the man.' Then he tells us
what those things were in which he could have trusted, and which
appear to have been the grand points in those days in which the
religious people, independent of the grace of God, the strict
devotees of that period, trusted for eternal life. Indeed, the Jews
used to say, 'If only two men of the human race were saved, one
would be a scribe, and the other a Pharisee.'

He tells us then, that he was "circumcised the eighth day of the

stock of Israel, of the tribe of Benjamin, a Hebrew of the
Hebrews." These were what we may call, in the language of our
day, his 'religious privileges.' Under this head, he could boast that
he was "circumcised the eighth day," the traditional law allowing
circumcision from the eighth day after birth till the twelfth, but
attaching peculiar sanctity to the eighth; that he was not a
Gentile, but a real Jew; that he was not from apostatizing Israel,
but of the tribe of Benjamin, which adhered to Judah when the
ten tribes departed; that he was not a Hellenistic, Gentilizing
Hebrew, who had forsaken the language of his fathers, and
adopted, in some measure, Grecian customs, but was "a Hebrew
of the Hebrews," a Jew throughout: born not only of two Hebrew
parents, but following out to the very letter the strict obligations
of the ceremonial law, as well as all the traditions of the elders.

With respect to his religious education and religious profession,

he could boast that he was "as touching the law, a Pharisee;" the
strictest of the sects; not a monastic Essene, not an infidel
Sadducee; but a rigid, austere, and unbending Pharisee. And to
shew that he had embraced this strict pharisaism, not from
hypocrisy, but from real fleshly enthusiasm—that his heart was
thoroughly in it—that it was not to deceive others, but that he
was really deceived himself—to shew that he had something
more than mere outside profession, that his creed had touched
his natural conscience, he shewed his "zeal by persecuting the
church," by abhorring, hating, and imprisoning the disciples of
the Lord of life. As he told King Agrippa, "I verily thought with
myself, that I ought to do many things contrary to the name of
Jesus of Nazareth: which thing I also did in Jerusalem; and many
of the saints did I shut up in prison, having received authority
from the chief priests; and when they were put to death, I gave
my voice against them. And I punished them oft in every
synagogue, and compelled them to blaspheme; and being
exceedingly mad against them, I persecuted them even unto
strange cities" (Acts 26:9-11).

As respecting his life and deportment before men, he could say,

"Touching the righteousness which is in the law, blameless;" that
is, outward righteousness. There are two kinds of righteousness
connected with the law; one of the law, another in the law.
These are not indeed distinct in their nature, for one
comprehends the other; but they are distinct as regards our
experience of them. For instance, the righteousness of the law
condemns an adulterous look as adultery; but the righteousness
in the law condemns but the outward act. He was not, then,
blameless touching the righteousness of the law, in its spirituality
and purity; but as touching the righteousness in the law, in its
observances and commands, he was blameless—leading a most
upright, consistent, virtuous, and honourable life. Surely if
heaven could be gained by religious privileges, a strict life, and
good works, Saul of Tarsus had, a fairer claim than anybody.

Now, you will observe that the strict religious professors of those
days rested for salvation upon those things which the apostle
enumerates as meeting in himself. And can we not find a strict
parallel now? Things are changed with time: but man's heart is
not changed, and the fleshly confidence of human nature is not
altered. Can we not then find now a precise parallel? Let us
endeavor to trace it out. Is it not the boast of many that they are
born of religious parents? Is not that a present parallel with
being—"a Hebrew of the Hebrews?" Do not others glory that they
were sprinkled in infancy by a minister of the Established Church?
Is not that parallel with "circumcised the eighth day?" Do not
others boast, that they have had a strictly religious education,
been trained up to piety from childhood, been instructed in the
Catechism and all things taught at the Sunday school, and been
carefully watched over by parents and guardians? Is not this a
parallel with Paul sitting at the feet of Gamaliel? Do not others
rely for salvation upon attending church or chapel regularly,
never omitting the ordinance or the sacrament, being constant in
their prayers night and morning, reading so many chapters of the
Bible every day, and living according to the strictest laws that
man has devised for them, or they can devise for themselves? Is
not this a parallel with "touching the law, a Pharisee?" Are there
not others who believe that they are doing God service when they
speak against the doctrines of grace, when they persecute
Christ's people, when they hate vital godliness as manifested in
the experience, or carried out in the life of God's family? Is not
this a parallel with, "concerning zeal, persecuting the church"?

And do not others expect heaven as the reward of their good

works, and pride themselves upon leading a moral, upright,
perfectly consistent life? Is not this parallel with "touching the
righteousness which is in the law blameless"?

Now upon these things, as I have observed, in their various

shapes, many are resting for salvation, from the most bigoted
Churchman to the most Radical Dissenter. Hundreds and
thousands are resting upon these things, as a means of climbing
to heaven, feeling persuaded that by their privileges and their
duties they shall have an abundant entrance into the kingdom of
glory. And had God suffered Paul to live and die in this delusion—
had he been stretched upon a deathbed the day before his
journey to Damascus. I believe in my conscience, he would have
gone out of life fully persuaded he was going to heaven, and
never have found out his mistake till the lightnings of divine
vengeance had struck his horrified soul down to eternal perdition.
He was so wrapped up in a lie, that nothing but the voice of the
Lord of life and glory from heaven, and the arrow of conviction
from the divine quiver penetrating into his conscience, could
bring him out of the delusion in which he was held so fast, and
strip him out of the garment in which he was so closely wrapped.

Where Paul was, thousands are: and only a few, a remnant

"according to the election of grace," the "vessels of mercy afore
prepared unto glory," are brought out of this state by a work of
grace upon their hearts, so as to be saved in Christ with an
everlasting salvation.

But having looked at Paul as he was before the Lord called him,
let us see now,

2. What Paul was after the Lord called him. If you look narrowly
and closely at the words of the text, you will observe two distinct
tenses. "What things were gain to me, those I counted loss."
Here we have the past tense. "Yea, doubtless, and I count all
things." There we have the present tense. And in the last clause
of the same verse, we have both the past and present: "For
whom I have suffered the loss of all things, and do count them
but dung that I may win Christ." The apostle, then, speaks of
what he had felt, and does now feel—what he had suffered, and
does now suffer, drawing a distinction between what he was in
time past, and what he is in time present. Thus, when the Lord
was pleased to arrest this persecutor on his errand of blood, and
opened up to his conscience the spirituality of the law in those
three days when Paul was at Damascus, he neither ate nor drank.
The law was then doing its work in his conscience, shewing itself
in all its strict purity; it was laying bare the hidden corruptions
that had before been covered over with the varnish of profession
and self-righteousness: it was stripping him, and opening up the
chambers of imagery within, carrying a death stroke to
everything boasted of and trusted in.

Now this, every child of God, every quickened vessel of mercy is,
more or, less, brought to feel, though he may not be three days
and nights, without eating or drinking, under the burning agonies
of a broken law. The Lord appears to have done the work quickly
in the case of Paul: and, by doing it quickly, made up by depth
and intensity, while it lasted, for the short time of duration. I
believe this is frequently the case with the Lord's people. All must
be brought to the same point: but where the work is more rapid,
it is usually more intense. The very same work of conviction and
condemnation, emptying and stripping, wounding and
slaughtering, breaking down and laying low, may be spread over
a number of years: and, being spread over a longer space, is not
so intense in feeling as when carried on in a shorter space of
time—the duration of the feeling during a longer period making
up for the intensity of the feeling when carried on in a shorter
space.

But, however, this was the effect—"what things were gain" to

him, he was brought to count "loss for Christ." He was made to
see that they were not helps, but positive hindrances. He does
not say, 'I count them as little value, but as absolute loss.' To use
an illustration: it is like a tradesman, who is obliged to transfer a
debt which he thought to be in his favour, to the opposite side of
the ledger—an account to pay, instead of to receive. Thus, when
the depth of his hypocrisy was laid open, when his own
righteousness was thoroughly held up to his view, when he came
to see light in God's light, and had the hidden corruptions of his
heart made bare—then he began to see that his former
acquirements, so far from being gain, were absolute loss; that so
far from being so many rounds in the ladder to take him up to the
Lord, they were so many rounds in the ladder to take him deeper
into the pit; that every step which he took in a way of fleshly
righteousness, instead of being a step to heaven, was a step from
heaven, and instead of bringing him nearer to God, carried him
farther from God. So that, absolutely and actually, with all his
profession, he was farther from God, in a worse state, than the
malefactor upon the cross, there expiring by the strong hand of
the law on account of the crimes he had done.

Now, when a man once sees this, he is brought into his right
spot: and he is never brought into his right spot before. When he
sees that all his religious privileges, all the doctrines his head is
stored with, all his piety and uprightness, all the consistency of
life in which he had gloried: that all these things were absolutely
hindrances instead of helps, really loss instead of gain: that set
him farther from heaven than nearer heaven—then he drops into
his right spot. But how should this be? I will tell you. Because he
trusted in them. If I am going, say to the East end of the Town,
and being unacquainted with the metropolis, take a turn leading
to the West end, I may walk very confidently forward: but I have
taken a wrong direction: and every step I take carries me from
the wished-for point. I cannot get right till I turn completely
round. So spiritually: while a man is traveling on in self-
righteousness, every step takes him farther from heaven, and
farther from the Lord Jesus Christ; and becomes to him positive
and absolute loss. But till his eyes are opened to see this, he
never can be in his right spot. Man will cleave to the flesh in one
form or another as long as he can; he never will give it up till
brought to this point, to count everything connected with the
flesh not merely not as gain, but absolute loss.

3. But there was another thing wrought in the apostle's mind to

bring him to this spot—a view of the Lord of life and glory by
the eye of living faith. He had a personal knowledge in his
heart and conscience of the glorious Person, atoning blood, dying
love, and justifying righteousness of the precious Immanuel.

These two things are absolutely needful to bring us to the spot

where the Lord brought Paul. There are two indispensable
operations of the Spirit upon the heart to produce in us a saving
work. All stripping will not do; all emptying will not suffice; all
slaughtering is not enough. These are necessary to bring us
down; but we want something else to raise us up, and bring
comfort. We want something sweet and precious, as well as
something bitter and painful; the honey and the honeycomb, the
milk and wine of gospel grace, as well as the gall and bitterness
of sin felt in a wounded conscience. And this is summed up in the
words, "The excellency of the knowledge of Christ Jesus my
Lord." Such a sweet application, such a blessed discovery, such
a divine manifestation to the eyes of the understanding, to the
heart and conscience of the believer is needed, as shall bring him
to know the Lord of life and glory as all his salvation and all his
desire, and make him to feel in the very depths of his conscience
before a heart-searching God that Jesus is in his eyes the
"altogether lovely."
Now, if the Lord has made your conscience tender let me, as a
friend ask you to search into your experience upon these two
points. Depend upon it, they are absolutely indispensable: they
are not to be smuggled over, not to be wrapped up, not to be
obscured: they are to be plain and conspicuous in a man's soul.
And only so far as they are plain and conspicuous in a man's soul,
has he any solid testimony, any good hope through grace, that he
has "the root of the matter" in him. These two points, then, must
be stamped on every quickened sinner's conscience in order to
give him an abundant entrance into the kingdom of God. He must
have been brought down, stripped and emptied, and have put his
mouth in the dust as a poor guilty sinner. And then he must have
had such a discovery to the eyes of his understanding, such a
revelation in his soul of the glorious Person, atoning blood, and
justifying righteousness of the Lord of life and glory, as shall have
raised up a measure of faith, hope, and love towards this blessed
Lord; so as to create some embraces of him in the arms of
affection, some cleaving to him with purpose of heart, some
delight in him as altogether precious, altogether glorious,
altogether lovely.

These are the two grand jewels in a believer's heart. The work of
the Spirit in stripping, and the work of the Spirit in clothing; the
work of the Spirit in pulling down, and the work of the Spirit in
raising up; the work of the Spirit in the law, and the work of the
Spirit in the gospel; the work of the Spirit in making self loathed,
and the work of the Spirit in making Jesus loved.

II.—We have looked at Paul as speaking of himself in the past

tense; let us now pass on to consider him speaking of himself
in the present tense, or the experience he was then going
through. I have before pointed out a difference in the tenses,
"Yea, doubtless, and I count all things but loss for the excellency
of the knowledge of Christ Jesus my Lord." If you observe, he
takes here a wider scope than he had taken in the preceding
verses. He said there, "What things were gain to me:" but he
goes further in his present experience; "yea doubtless, and I
count all things." Before he merely counted those things to be
loss that he once boasted in: but as he advanced further in the
knowledge of his own heart, as he had greater discoveries of the
glorious perfections of Christ, as he was led down deeper into the
quagmire of felt corruption, and led higher up into views of the
glorious Immanuel, he gets into another branch of spiritual
arithmetic: he embraces a wider scope of calculation: he now
says. "I count all things." 'There was a time when I looked at
many things that I highly prized, and them I counted a dead loss:
but now I am brought further: for I count everything in the world
loss "for the excellency of the knowledge of Christ Jesus my
Lord."

You see, until a man is brought into the gospel conflict, his vision
is for the most part dim and obscured. There are two conflicts:
one, a legal conflict; the other, a gospel conflict. While under the
legal conflict, the eye is directed to the things, which were once
counted as gain; our own righteousness, our own strength, our
own creature performances, our fleshly religion; and all come to
nought. But when the gospel conflict comes, it is a different thing.
A legal conflict is when there is no knowledge of Christ in the
soul; but in a gospel conflict, we are brought to this point, not
merely to count as dung and loss the things so esteemed of old,
but everything in the world, however enchanting, beautiful,
attractive, ensnaring, and alluring—to count all things as loss "for
the excellency of the knowledge of Christ Jesus our Lord."

Every man has his own peculiar temptations, his own natural
inclinations, his own besetments; each has his various objects of
pursuit, which he makes his idol. There is the studious man bent
upon languages and sciences; the industrious tradesman buried
in business; the man elevated a little above the ordinary mass of
God's people, striving to add to, or preserve his respectability.
Each person has a disposition peculiar to himself. Now, under the
law, we may renounce many things, and yet not renounce these
bosom idols. We may renounce our own strength, our own
righteousness, our own wisdom; renounce many things in the
flesh, and put them aside; but yet, after all, a whole nest of
bosom idols may be untouched. Just a few hornets may have
been struck down as they buzzed out of their holes, but a whole
nest of them remains in the deeps of man's depraved heart,
which must be burnt out, that the Lord of life and glory may reign
supreme.

Look into your heart. Have you not some idol in your bosom—
your science, your business, your child, your wife, your husband?
The idol self, in some shape or another? Is there not something
which day after day catches your eye, entangles your feet, draws
you from the Lord, overcomes you, proves your bosom idol that
you cannot master? I know it is so with me. There is one thing or
another working perpetually: there is an idolatrous heart, an
adulterous eye, a roving mind, a lusting imagination perpetually
going after something which conscience tells me is hateful to
God, and hateful to myself in my right mind.

Now, in order to be brought to the point to which God brought

Paul, to esteem all things as loss, to count them as dung, and
trample them under foot for the sake of the Lord of life and glory,
"for the excellency of the knowledge of Christ Jesus our Lord," we
need two distinct operations of the Spirit upon our soul. We need,
first of all, to be put into the furnace; we need to have our faith
tried as by fire; we need to have temptations, afflictions,
perplexities, heartrending grief's and sorrows, in order to
overthrow, destroy, put down, and subdue those cursed idols in
our heart, which are the root of all sin. It is not your outward
profession; your coming to chapel regularly; your going to hear a
man preach certain doctrines, or liking to hear certain
experiences traced out. A man may do all this, and yet wrap up
an idol in his bosom all the week long; be wandering after his
lusts all the day, and come with a smooth countenance on Lord's
Day morning, as though all his heart and soul were with the Lord
of life and glory.

Such is the heart of every man. We must go then into the furnace
of affliction; we must have trials, exercises, perplexities, the
sharp rod of chastisement, painful, sometimes heartrending
afflictions, to pluck up these dunghill gods, and overthrow these
idols in our heart. This is the reason why so many of God's people
are in affliction—why one has such a suffering body; another,
such trying circumstances; a third, such rebellious children; a
fourth, such a persecuting husband; a fifth, such opposition from
the world; a sixth, such temptations from the devil; a seventh,
such an acquaintance with the awful corruptions of his heart: an
eighth, such a desponding mind: a ninth, such shattered nerves. I
say this is the reason why they have this painful discipline, that
they may not lean upon Egypt or Assyria because they are but
broken reeds that will run into their hands and pierce them.

But besides these, there is another thing wanted, that is, greater
discoveries, more openings up, sweeter revelations, more
enlarged manifestations of the glory, grace, love, blood,
preciousness and beauty of Immanuel: so as not merely to put
down idolatry, not merely to overcome this master sin in them,
but to substitute an Object of spiritual worship, and raise up in
their heart the actings of heavenly affection and love.

Here then is the difference. In the legal conflict, there is the law
killing, cursing, and condemning. But in the gospel conflict, there
are furnaces, floods, troubles, temptations, exercises,
perplexities, and sorrows. All these things lay a man lower than
ever he was laid before, bring him down more into the dust, and
thus make a way for larger openings up of the gospel, more
glorious discoveries of salvation through Jesus, and greater
sweetness, preciousness, and suitability in him. The
superaboundings of grace become thus more manifested over the
aboundings of sin; and this experience will purge out that which
the law never touched, and clear out of the heart those idols that
the commandment had not effectually put down. This lifts up the
Lord of life and glory in the soul, that he may be, as the apostle
says, "our Lord"—"for the excellency of the knowledge of
Christ Jesus my Lord"—to worship him as our Lord, to cleave to
him as our Lord, to glory in him as our Lord—to give up
ourselves, with all the affections of our souls, into his hands.
But to be brought here, the apostle says, "he had suffered the
loss of all things." Worldly prospects, fleshly joys, human
honours, lucrative gains, the esteem of my fellow-creatures, the
esteem of my own heart, that more delicious morsel than the
esteem of others—I have suffered "the loss of all these things."
'But do I repent of it.'? do I regret it? do I murmur at it? do I kick
at the hand that has stripped me?' 'No,' says the apostle, I count
them all dung, that defiles my feet if it but touch them: things
only fit to be cast to the dogs: mere offal in the street, that I turn
my eyes away from.' O what an experience is this! How few, and
how rarely those few, come to this spot to be brought in solemn
moments before God to have such a taste of the beauty,
preciousness and love of Jesus—to have such a going forth of
holy affection to his bosom, as absolutely to count all things but
as dung! Where is the man to be found who knows much of this?
And if you find the man, how long is he there? It was doubtless
with Paul a far more enduring feeling than with any of us. But
how many of us can say, 'Such is the daily bent of our minds,
such the hourly experience of our hearts'? I dare not say it. There
have been times when just for a short half-hour, a transient
period, a very transient one, I have felt it. But to say, that this is
my or your experience daily and hourly—to count all things but
dung and dross for the excellency of Christ Jesus my Lord—where
is the man? where is the woman?—in London, or the country?—
who can rise up to this height of glorious and blessed experience?
We must indeed know something of it, have a measure of the
very same experience, though different in degree, or we have
nothing. But as for rising up into a full measure of it, I have never
seen the man yet who comes even up to the tenth part of it—to
"count all things but dung for the excellency of the knowledge of
Christ Jesus his Lord!" And, for that to be his daily, hourly
experience—I have never yet fastened my eyes upon either the
man or the woman who could enter into such depths, or such
heights of experience as this. Do not misunderstand me. There
are seasons, there are moments, when it is felt; but to have it of
an enduring nature, abiding with a man through the week,
accompanying him all day, going with him to bed, getting up with
him the morning, continuing with him through all his hourly
occupations—I have not seen the man yet, who could ever come
near by a thousand leagues thus to experience what the apostle
Paul declared he felt an abiding reality in his bosom.

III.—But we pass on to consider, what Paul hoped, and what

he wanted to be. If you observe, he gives us, lower down, some
intimation that all God's family were not thus perfect. He says,
"Let us therefore, as many as be perfect"—that is, adult, matured
in the divine life—"be thus minded: and if in anything ye be
otherwise minded"—as though he saw that all to whom he wrote
were not in his experience, had not attained to this height—"God
shall reveal even this unto you." 'Be not discouraged and cast
down: God is able to reveal it in your heart, and work it in your
soul's experience.' "Nevertheless, whereto we have already
attained"—each according to his own measure—"let us walk by
the same rule, let us mind the same thing." Let us have our eyes
fixed upon the same point. Let us not suppose there is one rule
for man, and another rule for another man. We must all have our
eyes fixed upon the same thing. I allow of degrees, but I allow of
no difference—an experience similar, though not the same—not
differing in nature, although it may differ in degree or
circumstance.

He was looking forward, then, to something future. "Not as

though I had already attained, either were already perfect: but I
follow after, if that I may apprehend that for which also I am
apprehended of Christ Jesus. Brethren, I count not myself to have
apprehended"—I do not know all that is to be known; I have not
felt all that is to be felt; I have not experienced all that is to be
experienced—"but this one thing I do"—like a racer running a
race—"forgetting the things that are behind, and reaching forth
unto those things which are before, I press toward the mark for
the prize of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus."

Now, what were the two things that he was aiming at? One was,
that he might win Christ; and the other, that he might be
found in him. These were what he hoped to enjoy. These were
what he was pressing forward to obtain. This was the ultimatum
of his wishes. This was the goal towards which his anxious steps
were pressing.

1. "That I might win Christ." What is the meaning of the

words? Nothing short of a personal enjoyment of Christ in the
soul. Nothing short of seeing him on earth by the eye of faith.
Nothing short of seeing him as he is, in open vision, in the realms
of glory above. I cannot allow for a single moment, that any other
explanation will suffice for the expression, 'to win Christ.' Christ in
the heart here—Christ in heaven hereafter. Christ seen by the
eye of faith below—Christ seen by the eye of open vision above.
Christ embraced and enjoyed in the arms of love and affection
upon earth—Christ beheld for ever in the realms of endless bliss
without a shadow between.

These, then, are the two things that every quickened soul is
pressing on to obtain—"to win Christ; and to be found in him."
What is my religion? Can I rest in that? What is my experience?
Can I rest in that? What my consistency? Can I rest in that? What
my knowledge? Can I rest in that? What my ability, my gifts, my
understanding, my education, my enlightened views? Can I rest
in them? If I do, it will be to my confusion. They will be found a
bed too short, and a covering too narrow. On what can I rest,
short of the Lord of life and glory? I never have been able to rest
in anything short of him. I hope never to be able to rest in
anything short of him.

But what is it to "win Christ?" It is to have him sweetly embraced

in the arms of our faith. It is to feel him manifesting his heavenly
glory in our souls. It is to have the application of his atoning
blood, in all its purging efficacy, to our conscience. It is to feel
our heart melted and swooning with the sweet ravishments of his
dying love, shed abroad even to overpowering. This is winning
Christ. Now, before we can thus win Christ, we must have a view
of Christ, we must behold his glory, "the glory as of the only
begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth." We must see the
matchless dignity of his glorious Person, the atoning efficacy of
his propitiating blood, the length and breadth, the depth and
height, of his surpassing love. We must have our heart ready to
burst with pantings, longings, and ardent desires that this blessed
Immanuel would come down from the heaven of heavens in
which he dwells beyond the veil, into our heart, and shed abroad
his precious dying love there.

Now, is not this your feeling, child of God? It has been mine, over
and over again. Is it not your feeling as you lie upon your bed,
sometimes, with sweet and earnest pantings after the Lord of life
and glory? As you walk by the way, as you are engaged in your
daily business, as you are secretly musing and meditating, are
there not often the goings forth of these longings and breathings
into the very bosom of the Lord? But you cannot have this, unless
you have seen him by the eye of an enlightened understanding,
by the eye of faith, and had a taste of his beauty, a glimpse of his
glory, and a discovery of his eternal preciousness. You must have
had this gleaming upon your eyes, as the beams of light gleam
through the windows. You must have had it dancing into your
heart, as the rays of the sun dance upon the waves of the sea.
You must have had a sweet incoming of the shinings of eternal
light upon your soul, melting it, and breaking it down at his
footstool, as the early dawn pierces through the clouds of night.
When you have seen and felt this you break forth—'O that I
might win Christ!' Like the ardent lover who longs to win his
bride, you long to enjoy his love and presence shed abroad in the
heart by the Holy Ghost.

But besides this winning him, enjoying him, having sweet

discoveries of him, and swooning away in the arms of his blessed
embracement below, there is a winning of him in glory; a being
with him face to face; such a personal and individual enjoyment
of him, in one's body and soul, as though there were not another
saint in heaven; as though all the inexhaustible love of
Immanuel, "God with us," were given to, and fixed upon one, and
there was no other in heaven to love but that individual saint! So
to win him, as the bride wins the bridegroom; so to win him, as
to be with him for ever when time shall be no more! Now, nothing
short of this will ever satisfy a Christian; nothing short of this will
do for a living soul; nothing short of this will fill up the unbounded
desires of an immortal spirit.

2. "And be found in him." The apostle knew a time was coming

when God would search Jerusalem as with candles. He knew a
day was hastening on when the secrets of all hearts would be
revealed. He knew an hour was approaching when the eyes of the
Lord would try, and the eyelids of the righteous Judge would
weigh the words and actions of men. And he knew in his own
soul's experience, that all who, in that awful day, were not found
in Christ, would be consigned to the eternal pit of woe. He knew
that when the Judge took his seat upon the great white throne,
and heaven and earth fled away from his presence, no one could
stand before his look of infinite justice and eternal purity, but
those who had a vital standing in the Son of God. And therefore,
looking to that awful time, and the solemnities of that day of
judgment, that day of wonders, this was the desire of his soul—
and towards that he pressed forward, as an active runner presses
towards the goal—"that he might be found in him;" that when the
Lord comes a second time to judgment, and his eyes run over the
assembled myriads, he might be found in the Man who is "a
refuge from the storm, and the shadow of a great rock in a weary
land," the only Saviour from the wrath to come, which will one
day burst upon the world. "Be found in him."—having a vital
union to him—in him, as vitally as the branch is in the vine—in
him, as actually as the limbs are in the body—in him, by an
eternal, vital, and indefeasible union.

But he knew, that if he were found in him, he would have on a

robe of righteousness such as the eyes of infinite Purity would
accept. "Not having mine own righteousness, which is of the
law,"—a cobweb garment, full of rents and tatters, which cannot
shelter deep-dyed, stained, and defiled nature from the
penetrating eye of infinite Purity. But as a beggar's dirty skin is
seen through a beggar's tattered rags, he knew that if he stood in
creature righteousness, the eye of infinite Justice would look
through the rents and tatters of that creature righteousness, and
see the black hue of depraved nature through those rents and
tatters.

And he knew that if God saw sin in him—if there were no garment
to cover his naked skin—the eye of infinite Purity would dash him
down into eternal flames. Therefore he says, "Not having mine
own righteousness, which is of the law"—a cobweb garment, a
thing of rags and tatters, a patchwork counterpane—"but that
which is through the faith of Christ, the righteousness which is of
God by faith"; that is, the righteousness of the God-man—the
pure, perfect, and spotless obedience of Immanuel, "God with
us," received by the hand of living faith in the soul, and the
enjoyment of it communicated to the heart through the operation
of the faith of God's elect: that I might have that righteousness
"which is through the faith of Christ," put upon my person,
imputed to me, considered as my own, by my believing in Jesus,
by my receiving him into my heart, by my looking wholly and
solely unto him, by my implicit dependence upon him—"the
righteousness which is of God," by the appointment of God,
wrought out by Immanuel, "God with us," and owned and
accepted by God the Father, as a righteousness justifying all
those that are found clothed in it.

Now I would ask whether you and I can lay down our feelings and
our experience side by side with the experience and feelings of
the apostle here? Thank God, I can in some measure find a
similarity in my feelings, and a oneness in my experience with
what the apostle has laid down as felt by himself in the text.
'There was a time,' say also some of you 'when I trusted in the
flesh, was very religious, very pious, very consistent, and was
thought to be a very good Christian: and had I so lived, and so
died. I had then no doubt I should go to heaven.' But there was a
change. You had the slaughtering-knife thrust into your heart to
let out the lifeblood of natural religion. Then convinced,
convicted, hewed down, and made to feel that in you, that is in
your flesh, dwelt no good thing: and therefore, that all your
righteousnesses were as filthy rags, and that you could not save
yourself by anything you could say or do: you were brought down
in contrition of spirit to cry, "God be merciful to me a sinner!"

Then, did you ever have a discovery of Jesus? some

manifestation of the Lord to your soul? some gleams, glances,
glimpses, and shinings in of heavenly rays? some liftings up?
some sweet tokens? some comforting views of the Son of God in
his beauty and glory? And did these produce this feeling in your
soul?—Away with everything but Jesus! All my own
righteousness, all my own attainments, all my idols, all my bosom
sins, all that nature loves and the flesh cleaves to—I count them
all but loss, I esteem them all but dung, that I would scarcely
touch with my foot to kick it away. This, in solemn moments, is
the heartfelt desire of my soul—to win Christ by a sweet
manifestation of his dying love; to see him as he is in glory; and
when he sits upon the great white throne, to be found in him,
having a vital union to him, clothed in his righteousness, washed
in his blood, and justified through the faith which is in him.'

Now, no experience short of this is worth a single thought.

Nothing short of this operation of God the Spirit upon a sinner's
conscience, is worth the name of religion. It is only another form
of the deceitful flesh; it is only another delusion of Satan as an
angel of light; it is but a garment too short, and a bed too
narrow; and it will leave the soul that lives and dies wrapped up
in it, to the awful judgment of an angry God, who is "a consuming
fire."

Look to it, you who desire to fear God, whether you can find
anything of this experience in your heart and conscience. A grain
of it will save you, if you can find a grain; but if you have none of
it, you may be the acutest critic of doctrinal truth, the most
consistent character, the most confident professor in the world—it
will never save you. If you live and die in a religion of the flesh,
you will live and die with a lie in your right hand.

The Lord mercifully keeps us from being deluded! The Lord will
keep his people: for the promise is, "He will keep the feet of his
saints." So that the Lord of life and glory will say when he stands
before the Father at the last day, surrounded by his ransomed
millions, "Behold I and the children which thou hast given me."
"Of all that thou hast given me, I have lost nothing!"
THE BETTER THINGS WHICH ACCOMPANY SALVATION

Preached at Zoar Chapel, Great Alie Street, London, on Lord's

Day Morning, July 30, 1843.

"But, beloved, we are persuaded better things of you, and things

that accompany salvation, though we thus speak." Hebrews 6:9

It appears, from several passages in this Epistle, that the

Hebrews, to whom it was written, were suffering under severe
persecutions; and not being firmly established in the faith, they
manifested under the pressure of these heavy trials a wavering
disposition. It is for this reason that we find the Apostle Paul
intermingling in this Epistle solemn warnings and admonitions
with suitable encouragements.

He felt for them as undergoing persecution; but his keen,

discerning eye perceived in some of them symptoms of wavering;
and this led him to speak to them in a tone of solemn
admonition, such as we scarcely find in any other of his Epistles.
In the sixth and tenth chapters, especially, of this Epistle, we find
two most solemn warnings; and perhaps there are no two
chapters in the Bible which have more tried God's people than
those just mentioned.

As the text is intimately connected with the fearful warning in the

sixth chapter, it will be necessary for me, as briefly as is
consistent with clearness, to drop a few hints on it, before I enter
on the words of the text. In so doing, I shall set out by stating it
as my firm persuasion that the Holy Ghost is not speaking of the
children of God in that place; but that when he is describing those
whom, if they should "fall away," it is impossible "to renew again
unto repentance," he means professors of religion, entirely
destitute of a work of grace on their souls. "It is impossible," he
says, "for those who were once enlightened, and have tasted of
the heavenly gift, and were made partakers of the Holy Ghost,
and have tasted the good word of God, and the powers of the
world to come, if they shall fall away, to renew them again unto
repentance, seeing they crucify to themselves the Son of God
afresh, and put him to an open shame."

If we look at the words, there certainly seems to be a very near

approach to what takes place in the heart of a child of God; and
yet, if we examine the passage more minutely, we find nothing
said in it of a work of grace, nothing of repentance unto life,
nothing of faith in Christ, nothing of hope in God's mercy, nothing
of love towards the people of God; in a word, nothing of that
spiritual teaching which makes a man wise unto salvation.

1. The first thing said of these awful characters, is, that they were
"once enlightened." The apostle does not say they were
quickened into spiritual life, regenerated, and born again; but he
speaks of them as being "enlightened."

Now there are two different kinds of enlightenment; the one,

spiritual and saving, such as the apostle speaks of in Eph 1:18,
"The eyes of your understanding being enlightened, that
ye may know what is the hope of his calling." And so David, "The
entrance of thy word giveth light"(Ps. 119:130). "With thee is the
fountain of light; in thy light shall we see light" (Ps. 36:9). In
these passages, spiritual saving light is spoken of; what the Lord
himself calls the "light of life" (John 8:12) ; that is, not merely
light to enlighten the understanding, but life accompanying it to
quicken the soul. But there is another enlightenment, and of that
the apostle speaks here, the enlightening of the natural
understanding; not a spiritual light, such as attends a
regenerating work on the conscience, but an intellectual light,
whereby the truth is perceived by the natural mind in the letter of
the word.

2. "And have tasted of the heavenly gift." In the apostolic

times "gifts" were communicated to the churches for the profit of
the saints. There were gifts of healing, of tongues, of prophecy,
and others such as we find mentioned in 1Co 12:8, 9. These were
given for the profit of the body, and were distinct things from
grace, as the apostle declares in 1Co 12:31; when, after
describing these gifts, he adds, "And yet show I unto you a more
excellent way," that of "charity" or love: and then he goes on to
say, "Though I speak with the tongues of men and of angels, and
have not charity, I am become as sounding brass, or a tinkling
cymbal; and though I have the gift of prophecy, and understand
all mysteries, and all knowledge; and though I have all faith, so
that I could remove mountains, and have not charity, I am
nothing."

These gifts then, are called "heavenly gifts," as being

communicated from heaven for certain purposes; but are not
"grace," whereby the soul is regenerated. In the exercise of these
gifts a natural pleasure was found by their possessors, here called
"tasting." Similarly in our day, there are gifts in prayer, gifts in
preaching, gifts in conversation, gifts in interpreting and
expounding the Scriptures. Now a man may have all these gifts,
and yet be entirely destitute of grace; and when he exercises
them, he may find a certain pleasure and delight in their use,
which is called a "tasting of the heavenly gift;" and is perfectly
distinct from eating the bread of life, enjoying the presence of
God, and feeding by faith on the savoury meat of the gospel.

3. But it is also said, they were "made partakers of the Holy

Ghost." This perhaps is one of the most stumbling expressions in
the whole passage; but I think we may clear it up by comparing
Scripture with Scripture. Do we not read of Saul that "the Spirit of
God came upon him, and he prophesied?" (1 Sam. 10:10). Is it
not also recorded when on one occasion Saul sent messengers to
take David, in two successive instances, when they came into the
presence of Samuel, "the Spirit of God was upon the messengers,
and they also prophesied?" (1 Sam. 19:20). Do we not read too
what the Lord says, Ex 31:2, 3, "See, I have called by name
Bezaleel, the son of Uri, the son of Hur, of the tribe of Judah; and
I have filled him with the Spirit of God, in wisdom, in
understanding, and in knowledge, and in all manner of
workmanship, to do all the work of the tabernacle?" And did not
Balaam speak by the Spirit, and prophesy wonderful things
concerning the Messiah? Thus in this outward sense, a man may
be "made a partaker of the Holy Ghost;" his natural
understanding being illuminated, but his soul never regenerated,
nor the grace of God communicated to his heart. Balaam and his
ass both spake as God moved their tongues, but the rider was no
more regenerated than his beast.

4. "And have tasted the good word of God, and the powers
of the world to come." There is much in the word of God, which
can be understood and relished by the natural understanding;
there is in parts great eloquence, many flowers of poetry, many
moving expressions, and pathetic sentiments; and all these
things may have a certain effect upon the natural mind, quite
independent of and distinct from any revelation or application of
truth to the soul by the power of the Holy Ghost, quite different
from the inward reception of truth in the heart and conscience.
There may be also a natural relish for "the good word of God,"
and a receiving of the gospel with gladness which is meant by
the expression "the world to come," where there is no peace
nor joy in believing.

But the Apostle having shewn how far a man may go in a

profession, and prove at last utterly destitute of vital godliness,
proceeds to bring forward a word of encouragement and
consolation for the people of God, who might have been tried and
exercised with the solemn warning set before them. He therefore
adds, in the words of the text, "But, beloved, we are persuaded
better things of you, and things that accompany salvation,
though we thus speak."

I.—What does he mean by these "better things?" He means

graces in opposition to gifts; the work of the Spirit upon the
heart and conscience, as a thing distinct from any mere
profession of religion, or any mere intellectual understanding and
natural reception of truth. And why are these "better things?"
They are better, because gifts are for time, grace for eternity;
gifts profit the church, grace saves the soul; gifts puff up men
with pride, grace gives a single eve to the glory of God; gifts,
when unaccompanied by the grace of God, harden the heart,
grace melts and softens the soul, and makes it meet for "the
inheritance of the saints in light": gifts leave a man where they
find him, or I might rather say, unaccompanied by grace, worse
than they found him for the more a man touches sacred
things with unclean hands, the more hardening effect they
have upon him, while grace in its communication, makes a man
a new creature, and lifts him up into the eternal enjoyment of the
Three-One God.

Inasmuch then, as eternity is better than time, salvation better

than damnation, and heaven better than hell; so are the blessed
graces and teachings of God's Spirit in the soul "better" than the
highest gifts and brightest attainments which are short of the
work and witness of the Holy Ghost in the heart.

II.—But the Apostle adds also, "things that accompany

salvation," which he was "persuaded" those to whom he wrote
were in possession of.

What then is "salvation?" In looking at salvation, we must

consider it from two points of view; salvation wrought out for us,
and salvation wrought out in us. Salvation was wrought out for
us by the finished work of the Son of God, when he cried with
expiring breath, "It is finished." The salvation of "the remnant
according to the election of grace" was then completely
accomplished, so that nothing could be added to, or taken from
it; for "by one offering he hath perfected for ever them that were
sanctified;" and thus the elect stand complete in Christ, without
"spot, or wrinkle, or any such thing."

But there is a salvation which is wrought out in us; the

manifestation and application of that salvation which Jesus has
wrought out by his sufferings, blood-shedding, and death: and
this we can only know experimentally, so far as the blessed Spirit
brings it into our hearts, and seals it there with holy unction and
heavenly savour.
But all the people of God cannot feel sure they have this salvation
as an experimental reality; doubts, fears, darkness, and
temptations becloud their path; Satan hurls his fiery darts into
their souls; and they are unable to realize their interest in the
Lord Jesus Christ and his salvation. They do not doubt whether
the Lord Jesus is the Saviour of those that believe; they know
that there is no other refuge for their guilty souls but the blood of
the Lamb. They are effectually stripped from cleaving to a
covenant of works; they are not running after things that cannot
profit them, nor hiding their heads in lying refuges; from all these
things they are effectually cut off, and cut out by a work of grace
on their souls. But through the unbelief of their hearts, the
deadness of their frames, the barrenness of their souls, and the
various temptations they are exercised with, they fear they have
not the marks of God's family, and are not able to realize their
interest in the love and blood of the Lamb.

The Apostle, therefore, speaks of "things that accompany

salvation;" that is, certain marks and signs, certain clear and
indubitable tokens of the work of grace on the soul. And,
speaking to the Hebrews, he says for their comfort and
encouragement, "we are persuaded," whatever be your doubts
and fears, whatever the darkness of your mind, however
exercised with sharp and severe temptations, "we are persuaded"
you are in possession of those "better things," of those "things
that accompany salvation;" and that this salvation is therefore
eternally yours.

Let us then with God's blessing, endeavour to trace out a few of

these "better things," these "things that accompany salvation;"
and shew how far better and more blessed they are than any gifts
that hypocrites or mere professors may be in possession of.

1. A work of grace on the soul then, is "a better thing" than

any mere gift, and is "a thing too which accompanies salvation."
And what is a work of grace on the soul? It is to be quickened by
the Spirit of God into spiritual life; it is to be made a new
creature, by being brought to experience the almighty work of
God on the conscience, renewing us in the spirit of our minds;
and it consists in the communication of eternal life to the soul,
with all its blessed consequences.

But wherever this work of grace takes place in a man's soul,

there will be certain fruits and results that follow out of it. A man
cannot be a partaker of the grace of God, and remain where he
was before the Spirit quickened his soul; being "a new creature,
old things are passed away" with him, and "all things are become
new." And thus, being a new creature, and having the life of God
in his soul, it will be manifested by the certain fruits that
invariably spring out of it.

And I know not a surer test that this good work is begun than
when the heart is made tender in God's fear. The Lord took
especial notice of this mark in Josiah, when Shaphan the scribe
read to him the book of the law, which Hilkiah had found in the
temple, and he sent to enquire of the Lord: "Because thine
heart was tender, and thou hast humbled thyself before the
Lord &c., I also have heard thee" (2 Kings 22:19). This
tenderness of heart was a mark in Josiah, on which the Lord, so
to speak, put his finger; it was a special token for good which
God selected from all the rest, as a testimony in his favour. The
heart is always tender which God has touched with his finger; this
tenderness being the fruit of the impression of the Lord's hand
upon the conscience.

This spiritual tenderness of heart is a very different thing from a

natural conscience. Many persons mistake the movings to and fro
of natural conscience for a heart made tender by the work of
God's Spirit. But you may know the difference between a natural
conscience, and a heart tender in God's fear by this, that the
natural conscience is always superstitious and uncertain; as the
Lord says, it "strains at a gnat, and swallows a camel." It is
exceedingly observant of self-inflicted austerities, and very fearful
of breaking through self-imposed rules; and whilst it will commit
sin which a man who has the fear of God in his heart would not
do for the world, it will stumble at mere unimportant trifles in
which an enlightened soul would not feel the least scruple. It will
"pay tithe of mint, anise, and cummin," whilst it "omits the
weightier matters of the law" (Matt. 23:23); and "will not go into
Pilate's judgment-hall lest it should be defiled" (John 18:28), at
the very time that it is seeking to imbrue its hands in the blood of
the Saviour.

But here is the mark of a heart tender in God's fear; it moves as

God the Spirit works upon it; it is like the mariner's compass,
which having been once touched by the magnet, always turns
toward the North; it may indeed oscillate and tremble backwards
and forwards, but still it will return to the pole, and ultimately
remain fixed at the point whence it was temporarily disturbed. So
when the heart has been touched by the Spirit, and has been
made tender in God's fear, it may for a time waver to the right
hand or to the left, but it is always trembling and fluctuating till it
points toward God, as the eternal centre of its happiness and
holiness.

2. Godly sorrow for sin is a "better thing" than any gift which a
mere professor may possess, and a thing too which invariably
"accompanies salvation." Godly sorrow for sin differs much from
natural conviction for sin. Powerful natural convictions, I believe,
for the most part are not felt more than once or twice in a man's
life; and when they have passed away, the conscience is more
seared than it was before, the world more eagerly grasped, and
sin more impetuously plunged into.

But godly sorrow is produced by a work of grace on the heart.

The eye of faith sees sin in the light of God's countenance, and
thus the soul becomes alive to its dreadful evil and horrible
character. The heart too is melted down into godly sorrow by
beholding the Saviour's sufferings, and viewing the Lord of life
and glory as stooping and agonizing under the weight of sin, not
only as imputed to him, but as pressing him down into anguish
and distress. And thus, godly sorrow for sin is not a thing which a
man feels once or twice in his life: but from time to time, as the
Spirit works it in his heart, godly sorrow flows forth. If he has
been entangled in sin, overcome by temptation, slidden back into
the world, or his heart has gone after idols, a living soul will not
pass it by as a thing of no consequence: but, sooner or later, the
Spirit touches his heart, godly sorrow flows out, and his soul is
melted and moved within him by feeling what a base wretch he is
in the sight of a holy God.

3. A "spirit of grace and supplications" springing up in the

heart from time to time, as the Lord works upon it, is a "better
thing" than any gift a reprobate may be in possession of, and a
thing too that "accompanies salvation." Now there is what is
called a gift in prayer, but that is a very different thing from the
communications of a "spirit of grace and supplications" by God
himself to the soul.

A man for instance may pray in public apparently most feelingly

and movingly; he may play well on his instrument, so as to touch
the passions, and work on the feelings of God's people; yet he
himself may be only "a tinkling brass," or "sounding cymbal," and
know nothing of "a spirit of grace and supplications" in his own
soul. But whenever there is a work of grace on the heart, it is
always accompanied by a spirit of prayer; as the Lord says, "I will
pour upon the house of David, and upon the inhabitants of
Jerusalem, the spirit of grace and of supplications" (Zech. 12:10).
And wherever it has been once poured out into a sinner's heart, it
will never leave him from the moment that God quickens his soul
until that blessed day when prayer shall end in praise.

I do not mean to say, that there may not be long suspensions of

it; that darkness of mind may never cover it; that coldness and
iciness of heart may never freeze it up; that emptiness and
barrenness of spirit may never seem to quench it: but in spite of,
and in the midst of all these things, the blessed "spirit of grace
and supplications" will from time to time rise up to its Source. If
this spirit of grace and supplications exists in your heart, if you
have not power to pray, you will have power to sigh and groan.
There will be again and again some inward going out after the
Lord, some panting after his presence, some expression of
dissatisfaction against self, some seeking his grace, some longing
and languishing after his manifested favour and love.

And thus, the spirit of prayer wherever once given, will from time
to time be springing up in the soul. But we cannot call it forth; we
may attempt it, but we shall feel powerless to produce it: yet the
Lord will sometimes and perhaps at a moment when we least
expect it, when we are cold, dull, stupid, and carnal, draw
up the desires and breathings which he has himself implanted,
and raise the soul up that it may spring upwards once more
towards its eternal and heavenly fountain.

4. Brokenness of heart, and contrition of spirit, is a "better

thing" than any mere gift, and a grace which "accompanies
salvation." The heart that feels the burden of sin, that suffers
under temptation, that groans beneath Satan's fiery assaults,
that bleeds under the wounds inflicted by committed evil, is
broken and contrite. This brokenness of heart and contrition of
spirit, is a thing which a child of God alone can feel. However
hard his heart at times may seem to be, there will be seasons of
spiritual reviving; however he may seem steeled against any
sense of love and mercy, or even of misery and guilt, from time
to time, when he is least expecting and looking for it, there will
be a breaking down of his soul before the Lord; there will be a
bewailing of himself, a turning from the world to seek the Lord's
favour, and a casting himself as a sinner once more on
undeserved mercy. Tears will flow down his cheeks, sighs burst
from his bosom, and he will lie humble at the Saviour's feet. If
your soul has ever felt this, you have a "better thing" than any
gift; for this brokenness of spirit is a thing that "accompanies
salvation," and is a sacrifice that God will not despise (Ps. 51:17).

5. Deadness to the world, an inward separation from the

things of time and sense, is a "better thing" than any mere gift,
and a thing too that "accompanies salvation." I believe no one is
really dead to the world but a child of God. A man may change
his world who is not separated from it: he may for instance leave
the profane world for the professing world; he may change from a
Churchman to a Dissenter, from an Independent to a Baptist; he
may become a member of a gospel church; he may, like Herod,
do many things, and hear ministers of truth gladly. But all the
time, unless he is made a partaker of "the divine nature" by a
work of grace in his soul, his heart is and ever must be in the
world.

The human heart must be engaged upon something; its affections

must be fixed upon some object; its thoughts and desires must
be occupied with one thing or other. If his heart, then, is not set
Godward, if his affections are not fixed upon Christ, if his soul is
not engaged on heavenly things, he may have the greatest
profession of religion, but his heart is still worldly, his affections
still earthly, and his soul still going out after idols. But where the
Lord has really touched the conscience with his finger, and made
himself precious to the soul, however a man may seem for a time
to be buried in the world, and his affections going out after
forbidden objects; however he may be "hewing out cisterns,
broken cisterns that can hold no water;" however he may secretly
backslide from the Lord, still he cannot break the hold that
eternal things have upon his heart; he cannot find real pleasure
in the world, though he may often seek it; nor bury himself
contentedly in its pursuits. There will be a restless dissatisfaction
with the things of time and sense, an aching void, and a turning
again to "the strong hold," a seeking the Lord, who only can
really satisfy the soul, and make it happy for time and eternity.

6. Faith in the Lord of life and glory; to receive him into our
hearts as the Christ of God, and view him with the eye of faith as
our once bleeding, suffering, and agonizing Lord, and now raised
to God's right hand as our Intercessor, Advocate, and Mediator—
this is a "better thing" than any gift, and a thing too that
"accompanies salvation." This the apostle clearly points out in this
chapter, where he says, "Be not slothful, but followers of them,
who through faith and patience inherit the promises."

He had not said a word about faith in those, of whom he declares

"it is impossible to renew them again unto repentance." He never
dropped a hint that they were partakers of this or any other
grace; but when he comes to the "better things," he puts his
finger immediately on living faith in the soul. This faith in the Son
of God, whereby he is believed on to life eternal, received into the
heart, adored by the spirit, enthroned in the affections, submitted
to and embraced with every faculty of the soul, is a blessing only
communicated to God's family. A faith which is lodged in the
secret court of conscience, in the deep recesses of a man's heart,
which views the Son of God, and receives him as all its salvation
and all its desire, and hangs upon his blood and righteousness;
such a faith as this is beyond the highest attainment of any gifted
hypocrite, and is a "better thing" than was ever possessed by the
most flourishing professor.

7. A hope in God's mercy, not the "hope of the hypocrite, that

shall perish;" but what the Scriptures call "a good hope through
grace;" a "hope which is as an anchor to the soul, both sure and
stedfast, that entereth into that within the veil;" such a spiritual
hope is a "better thing" than any mere gift, and a thing too that
"accompanies salvation." We do not find that the apostle said
anything about hope as dwelling in those awful characters, whom
he compares to "the earth, which beareth thorns and briers, and
is therefore rejected, and nigh unto cursing, whose end is to be
burned." They indeed had a heavenly gift, and an enlightened
understanding, and did many wonderful things; but they never
had hope, "as an anchor to the soul," to keep it steady in the
winds and storms. They had not on board their gallant bark this
heavenly anchor, which was never known to break or fail,
because its flukes take hold of the flesh of the God-Man Mediator,
and its cable forms a living communication between the storm-
tossed vessel and him in whom it anchors.

The hope which penetrates beyond the things of time and sense,
and enters in and anchors upon a blessed Jesus, was never
possessed by the most gifted professor that ever deceived
himself, or ever deceived the church of God. And what is the root
of this good hope through grace? The Lord's own work and
witness in the conscience, his tokens for good, his manifested
favour, enabling the soul to look to Christ as his forerunner who
has entered within the veil. This hope which "maketh not
ashamed" does not arise from anything in the flesh, does not
hang upon the approbation of man, does not depend upon the
testimony of the creature; it passes beyond all these things, and
enters within the veil, into the immediate presence of God, where
Jesus is sitting as Mediator and Advocate.

8. And love also is "a better thing," and a thing that

"accompanies salvation." Love is the crowning point of all: as the
apostle says, "Though I have the gift of prophecy, and
understand all mysteries, and all knowledge; and though I have
all faith, so that I could remove mountains, and have not love, I
am nothing," but "sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal." We do
not find love mentioned in the catalogue of the "heavenly gifts."
Those whom it was impossible to renew again unto repentance
were not made partakers of this blessed grace.

But, on the contrary, the apostle, in speaking to the believers,

says, "God is not unrighteous to forget your work and labour of
love" (Heb. 6:10). The other wretched apostates might have
every gift, yet they were destitute of love; and being destitute of
that, had not passed from death unto life. And what is love? It is
a grace that changes not; one of the three heavenly sisters, and
the greatest of them all; for "now abideth faith, hope, and love,
these three; but the greatest of these is love" (1 Cor. 13:13).
Faith will be changed into sight, and hope into fruition, but love
remains the same, for "God is love."

If your soul, then, has ever known what it is to love God, and to
feel the flowings out of affection towards the Lord Jesus Christ; if
you have felt him precious to your soul, you have a thing that
"accompanies salvation." You are not a poor miserable self-
deceived professor, not a Satan-deluded wretch, that flutters for
a little time in the religious world, like a moth around the evening
candle, till at last it burns its wings, and is destroyed in the
flame. But if ever the Lord Jesus Christ has been made precious
to your soul, it is because you have embraced him in the arms of
a living faith, as the Scripture says, "Unto you therefore which
believe he is precious" (1 Pet. 2:7).

But love comprehends not only love to God, but love also to
God's people. The apostle especially insists on this mark in the
verses following the text. "But God is not unrighteous to forget
your work and labour of love, which ye have shewed towards his
name, in that ye have ministered to the saints, and do minister"
(Heb. 6:10). The Apostle John, too, says, "We know that we have
passed from death unto life, because we love the brethren" (1
John 3:14). This is the first evidence the soul usually has of its
having "passed from death unto life," that it sensibly feels a union
of spirit with God's people, a drawing forth of affection to those
who are manifest partakers of the grace of God.

This union with the children of God is better felt than described.
There is often a sweet knitting of spirit, a blessed interweaving
and interlacing of hearts, when God's people come together, and
speak of the things which they have tasted, felt, and handled.
The Spirit of God rests on them, and baptizes them into a blessed
union with each other, so that their very souls are melted
together, and they embrace each other, just as though they had
but one heart and one spirit: as the Holy Ghost describes the
early Christians, "they were all of one heart and one soul" (Acts
4:32). Their spirits were so fused by the heat of divine love into
each other, their hearts were so intermingled, and there was such
a flowing out of mutual affection, that all the company seemed to
have but one heart and one soul amongst them.

Now, my friends, just see if you can realize this one evidence in
your soul. You meet with a person, say, whom you have never
seen before; he is, perhaps, one from whom in the pride of your
heart you would turn away with disdain; he has no personal gifts,
nothing whatever naturally to recommend him; or he may be a
person against whom you have been prejudiced, and when you
see him you look on him with distaste or sullen aversion. But he
begins to speak; and as you listen, you feel all your prejudice
give way; the bar is effectually broken down; and there is a
sweet melting of your heart into his, and his into yours, and a
mutual flowing forth of love to each other. Now, if your soul has
ever experienced this, you are not a gifted hypocrite, though you
may have gifts, but one of those whom the Lord has taught by his
Spirit, and are in possession of those "better things" that
"accompany salvation."

God's children fear to be deceived, and if a man have no such

fear, the probability is that he is deceived already. All God's
people know the deceitfulness of the human heart, and the
abounding hypocrisy of their corrupt nature; they are more or
less alive to the devices of Satan; and all know what a dreadful
thing it is to be deluded, and have a portion with the hypocrites,
where there is "weeping, and wailing, and gnashing of teeth."

III.—The Scriptures, then, have brought certain marks not only to

test but also to comfort God's people. But in order to keep them
tremblingly alive to the fear of being deceived; in order to set up
an effectual beacon lest their vessel should run upon the rocks,
the blessed Spirit has revealed such passages as we find in the
sixth and tenth chapters of the Hebrews. They seem set up by
the Spirit of God, as a lighthouse at the entrance of a harbour. Is
it not so naturally? Some shoal or sandbank often lies near the
entrance of the port, which the mariner has to guard against.
How is he guarded? A lighthouse is erected, on or near the spot,
which warns him of the shoal.
Now I look on this chapter, and the tenth, as two lighthouses,
standing near the entrance of the harbour of eternal safety. And
their language is, "Beware of this shoal! Take care of that
sandbank! There are gifts without grace; there is profession
without possession; there is form without power; there is a name
to live whilst the soul is dead." The shoal naturally often lies at
the very entrance of a harbour: and as the ship makes for the
port, the sandbank lies in her very course; but when the harbour
is neared, the friendly beacon not only warns her of the shoal,
but also points out the safe passage into the haven. And so,
spiritually, from these two chapters many of God's people have
seen what shoals lie in the way, and have, perhaps, before they
were warned off, come near enough to see the fragments of the
shipwrecked vessels. The gallant barks that sailed from the same
ports with themselves they have seen wrecked on the rocks, their
freight lost, and the dead bodies and broken fragments floating
on the waves. But these never looked for the lighthouse, nor saw
the bank; they were intoxicated, or fast asleep; they were sure of
going to heaven; and on they went, reckless and thoughtless, till
the vessel struck on the shoal, and every hand on board
perished.

These awful warnings and solemn admonitions seem to me so

written that they may scrape, so to speak, as nearly as possible
the quick of a man's flesh. And they appear couched in language
of purposed ambiguity that they may be trying passages; nay,
the very beauty and efficacy of them, and the real good to be
wrought by them, is in their ambiguity; so that the people of God
may take a more solemn warning by them, and may cry unto the
Lord more earnestly that they may not be deceived.

Then, my friends, it is not the poor desponding children of God,

who are tried by these passages, that have reason to fear them.
Their being thus tried shows that their conscience is tender in
God's fear, and that they are "the earth which drinketh in the rain
that cometh oft upon it, and bringing forth herbs meet for them
by whom it is dressed, receiveth blessing from God;" and that
they are not that "which beareth thorns and briers, which is
rejected, and is nigh unto cursing, whose end is to be burned."

And thus, these very fears and suspicions, by which many of

God's people are exercised, causing strong cries unto the Lord,
that he would teach, guide, and lead them, are so many blessed
marks that they are not graceless persons, but partakers of the
grace of God; and at the same time prove, "that he which hath
begun a good work in them" will carry it on, and "will perform it
unto the day of Jesus Christ," and bring them into the eternal
enjoyment of God that they may see him for themselves, and not
for another.
THE BITTER WATERS SWEETENED

Preached at Providence Chapel, Eden Street, London, on Lord's

Day Morning, July 28, 1850

"And when they came to Marah, they could not drink of the
waters of Marah, for they were bitter; therefore the name of it
was called Marah. And the people murmured against Moses,
saying, what shall we drink? And he cried unto the Lord; and the
Lord shewed him a tree, which when he had cast into the waters,
the waters were made sweet." Exodus 15:23-25

The children of Israel after the flesh were a typical people; and
therefore the dealings of God with them were typical and
figurative of His dealings with the spiritual Israel. When we see
this, and read the Old Testament Scriptures with an enlightened
eye, what beauty does it add to the sacred page! We read these
records then, not as so many historical documents, but as
descriptive of the children of God, and of His mercy, love and
grace towards them. And thus their experience becomes brought
home to our own heart and our own bosom. We can see in them
our own features, and read in the dealings of God with them the
dealings of God with our own souls now.

I need not run through the history of the children of Israel to

prove this. Every step they took is, more or less, a proof that the
Lord dealt with them outwardly as He deals with his spiritual
Israel inwardly. Their state, for instance, in Egypt typified the
death and darkness of the people of God before they are
quickened by the blessed Spirit. The Paschal Lamb of which they
partook, and the blood sprinkled upon the lintel and side-posts,
showed forth the redemption of Christ, and the application of His
precious blood to the conscience. The passing through the Red
Sea signifies the baptism wherewith they are baptised, when the
love of God is shed abroad in their hearts by the Holy Ghost; and
their seeing their enemies dead upon the seashore, signifies the
rejoicing of a child of God at finding his sins cast into the sea, and
overthrown into dead carcases by the mighty power of Christ.

But we come now to a strange passage in their history. They little

expected, as we should little expect, that so heavy a trial would
come immediately upon the back of this astonishing deliverance.
And what was this trial? "They went three days in the wilderness,
and found no water." In this humid climate, we can scarcely
conceive what a privation this must have been. But we should not
like even in this wet clime, and at this dripping season, to be
without water for three days. No water to drink, no water to wash
with! But look at this vast multitude, amounting to two millions,
wandering in a barren desert, with a scorching sun above and
parched sands beneath; men, women, children, cattle,
languishing, and all but for dying of thirst! And this for three
days! One can scarcely conceive what a privation, what a scene
of horror it must have been. But, at the end of three days, water
is discovered. They catch a glimpse of palm trees in the
wilderness, and perhaps see the glimmering of streams beneath
them. You may well conceive what joy would fill the camp. We
may well imagine what a universal shout of exultation there
would be. What hurrying on to partake of the waters that
glistened before their eye in the distance? But alas! when they
came there, a further disappointment awaited them. "They came
to Marah, and they could not drink of the waters of Marah."
Though for three days they had been without water and were
dying from thirst, yet when they came to these waters, they were
so bitter and brackish, that absolutely they could not drink! What
a blow! what a stroke upon stroke! This was indeed striking the
dying dead. This was indeed adding grief to their sorrow and
heaping calamity upon calamity.

Well, what did they do? What you and I no doubt would have
done. They murmured and rebelled, and cried out against Moses
for bringing them out of Egypt, with its beautiful Nile, and leading
them into this wilderness, where for three days they had no
water; and when they came to water, it was so bitter they could
not drink. And what did Moses do? Did he join with them? Did he
encourage their murmuring, or take part in their rebellion? No; he
did what he ever did, and what every child of God must sooner or
later do—he "cried unto the Lord." And did he "cry" in vain? Was
the Lord a "God afar off, and not at hand?" Was His hand
shortened that it could not save, or His ear heavy that it could
not hear? No. The same almighty arm that had brought them
through the Red Sea found a way of escape. "The Lord shewed
him a tree, which when he had cast into the waters, the waters
were made sweet."

Now, upon this foundation I shall, with God's blessing, endeavour

to rear a spiritual building. Four things seem to strike my mind as
connected with, and flowing out of our text:

I. —The bitter waters of Marah.

II.—The murmuring of the people.

II.—-The cry of Moses.

IV.—The healing of the waters.

May the Lord enable me to speak this morning in such a way as

He shall condescend to bless to our souls.
I.—In looking at these waters of Marah, it seems that we have to
consider two things respecting them: first, what these waters
spiritually and typically represented. Secondly, what is
intimated by the bitterness of these waters.

We cannot understand by these waters the water of life. There is

nothing analogous in the waters of Marah to the streams that
gushed out of the rock when smitten by the rod of Moses; for
those waters were and ever must be intrinsically sweet. Nor do
they resemble the waters seen by the prophet Ezekiel that flowed
out of the temple, which when they went into the salt sea healed
its bitterness (Ezek. 47:1-9). These waters, then, cannot be the
waters of life, the streams that flow out of the bleeding side of
the Redeemer. What then are they? Why, they seem to my mind
to denote things in themselves perfectly suitable and adapted to
our natural constitution, and yet embittered by sin; because by
the bitterness that is in the waters, I mainly understand sin, and
as its necessary consequence and never-failing attendant,
sorrow.

When God created the world He pronounced it "very good;" the

waters then were sweet. Man, in his primitive innocency, was
adapted to the world in its original purity; but "sin entered into
the world, and death by sin." Satan was allowed to cast
bitterness into these waters; and ever since, sin and sorrow have
embittered all circumstances, states and conditions, in a word,
everything that would have been otherwise sweet and adapted to
our present state of existence.

Let me illustrate this by a few particulars, and show how sin, and
its consequence sorrow, have embittered all the streams that
otherwise would have been sweet and innocent, healthful and
pure.

1. First, look at the world generally. It is a fair world, even in

ruins. There is a natural beauty in it, though shattered by the fall.
Yet, though outwardly lovely, sin has marred all. We might, in
travelling, see a beautiful prospect; a village, for instance,
nestling in a valley, by some picturesque mountain side in
Switzerland or lake in the North of England, and say, "Beauty is
here; and with beauty, there must be happiness and innocence."
But, if we penetrated beneath the surface of this external beauty,
what should we see but sin? This beautiful village is probably but
a den of drunkenness and profligacy. Thus these waters, which
naturally were adapted to the constitution of man, made suitable
to him, and he suitable to them, have all been polluted, defiled
and embittered by sin cast into them. So, wherever we go, we
find sin embittering everything. There is not a country, not a
town, not a village, not a family, not a bosom, in which sin is not,
and which sin has not embittered—embittered by alienating it
from the source of all true, real happiness.
2. Again. There is your lawful occupation in life; your
business, your shop, your counting-house, your farm; the calling
that God has appointed for you to gain your daily bread by. These
are streams of water necessary to your actual existence. You
could no more live without them than you could exist without the
bread and water that perish. And yet, sin and sorrow embitter all;
disappointment, vexation, temptation flow out of and mingle with
everything you set your hand to. So that when you would satiate
your thirst at these streams they are "waters of Marah" which you
cannot drink. If not actual sin, yet disappointment will attend
them. I do not believe that you can carry on your lawful calling
without sin being intermingled with it. I do not mean open,
allowed sin. But sin will interfere, will intrude, will creep in, will
work. You can scarcely attend to your lawful calling without in
some way partaking of the evil mingled with it. And if not sin, yet
there will be sorrow and disappointment. If there be nothing in
conscience against you in carrying on your daily business and
concerns, yet there will be losses, crosses, bad debts,
disappointments and vexations from others. Thus when you
would take a sweet and luscious draught from the occupations of
life, the cup is dashed from your lips by the bitterness of its
contents.

3. Look again at the social relations of life. All are embittered.

Let us picture for a few moments a young couple. How roseate is
the hue, which invests their life! how happy they are going to be,
never dreaming of sorrow and trouble! All is bright sunshine. Let
them live a few years; let them have children; let them get into
middle life, and the cares of a family come upon them; and then
see whether their young visions have been realized—whether all
has been of a rosy colour, whether dark clouds have not hovered
over those domestic scenes from which they once thought to
drink so much happiness. How often children grow up to be their
parents' disappointment and misery! Wives and husbands,
instead of being mutual sources of happiness and comfort, prove
mutual plagues. Friends, who once seemed so true, turn into
enemies; relations, from whom we should expect every kindness
and help, grow cold or hostile. How all these domestic relations in
various instances are marred and embittered by sin or sorrow! So
that, when like the children of Israel, we would fain stoop down,
and drink at these sources of happiness and they would be
sources of happiness but for the marred state of the world,
and the sin in men's hearts we cannot drink the waters; they
are embittered; they are "Marah."

4. And so with the human body. God made the body healthy, as
He made the soul pure: but when sin entered into the soul,
sickness came into the body. How many of God's people have
their lives embittered through ill health, and all their pleasing
prospects disappointed, broken up, crushed, and thrown down by
a load of illness and bodily infirmities.

Now here are the waters of "Marah"—sorrow, vexation,

bitterness, disappointment marring everything; so that we cannot
drink of the otherwise sweet streams of life. And it is a mercy
that we cannot. Could we drink of them we should want no other
waters. Could we assuage our thirst at these earthly rills, we
should want no streams of that river which "maketh glad the city
of God." If we could take our fill of earthly comfort and worldly
happiness, we should never want to have the consolations of the
blessed Spirit, or to drink out of the fulness of the Lord Jesus
Christ.

But this is very disappointing. To have bitterness in everything,

and bitterness in those things most from which you would fain
derive most pleasure; that directly you are looking forward to
some worldly happiness, as the children of Israel hurried onward
to the waters glimmering under the palm trees, yet no sooner do
you come to that scene of anticipated pleasure, than you find it
embittered; some disappointment, some sorrow, some vexation,
some sin mars all. Is this very pleasing? Is this what nature
loves? Does this go down very smoothly? Not whilst man is what
he is. Did the children of Israel like it? No; they "murmured."

II.—And this brings us to our second point, which is, the

murmuring of the rebellious flesh against these dispensations.
When the Lord is not present to bless and smile upon the soul, is
it not very hard work to have so many trials, vexations and
disappointments; to find everything here embittered; that God
will not let you have a gourd to rejoice in; that you cannot sit
down and say, "Come, now I am going to be comfortable; here is
at last a little rest?" Is it not very vexatious, very disappointing,
very contrary to every feeling of our natural heart, that the Lord
will never let us take comfort in anything but Himself? that when
we would fain stretch forth our arm and embrace an earthly joy,
there is a hand that dashes it from our lips? when we would
stoop, and drink the waters that glimmer in the desert, they are
so salt, brackish, and bitter, that we cannot slake our thirst at
them?

1. Now, say that you have many disappointments in business.

Are they pleasing? When the postman brings you a letter, for
instance, full of bad news: that some one has failed who owes
you a sum of money; do you feel very comfortable under it? Is it
not much against the grain? And does not this raise up in your
carnal mind murmuring and fretfulness, and a rebellious feeling
that you should be so hardly dealt with? You can look abroad,
perhaps, and see how others get on in the world—men whom you
have known in poverty riding in their carriages, and you always
crossed, disappointed, ground down and everything going against
you. This is not very pleasant to flesh and blood; this is contrary
to nature; and therefore nature murmurs, frets, repines, rebels
against these dispensations.

2. Or, you have ill health, and cannot do as others: exertion is a

pain to you; your nerves are shattered and your whole frame
disorganised from constitutional debility; everything is
wearisome—the "grasshopper a burden." You look round, and see
people walking about in such health and strength, and you
perhaps racked with pain, or your frame altogether shattered,
and constitution gone. Why, this will raise up in the mind, at
times, some very unpleasant feelings. There will be murmuring,
rebellion and fretfulness against God when you see others dealt
with so favourably, and you dealt with, as you think, in a way so
contrary.

3. Your own family, perhaps your sons and daughters, are not
what you wish them to be. You look abroad and see the sons of
others steady; their daughters doing well, married and settled
comfortably in life; while, as regards yourself, things are just the
contrary: everything is opposed to what your nature wants, and
what your carnal mind loves. And, instead of sitting down quietly,
and bearing these afflictions and sorrows, there is a heaving up of
the carnal mind against them, a working of rebellion, a repining,
a murmuring, as though the Lord dealt with you very hardly, and
nobody ever had such a weight to carry as yourself.

4. Or again, you have a continual cross, and feel a body of sin

and death always plaguing you; so as never to be let alone, or as
Job says, not to have a sufficient time "to swallow down your
spittle;" but are vexed and tried day after day. There is some
temptation, and you entangled in it; some bait, and you
entrapped; some discovery of evil in your heart which you had
never seen before. And you think there never was anybody like
you; so harassed, so exercised, so tried, so tempted, so cast
down; having withal so little grace, so little spirituality, and
finding so little in your heart of which you can say, "Thank God, I
have some real religion now." Now, when the mind is thus
exercised, tried and cast down with a thousand things, unless
God be present, and His grace intervene, there will be much of
this fretfulness, repining and murmuring in the carnal mind.

But is this all? Would it do to leave you thus? Can a living soul
stand here? No. There must be something more than this. It is
sad work to have nothing but bitterness and murmuring; and
therefore, we will pass on to our third point;

III.—Which is what a living soul sooner or later must do and

does. "Moses cried unto the Lord." And this is what we do
when we have no one else to go to. When we come to the waters
of Marah, and find we cannot drink; when there is nothing but
bitterness and disappointment, then there is at first a struggle, a
murmuring, a rebelling, which only makes matters worse than
before. But, in tender mercy, the Lord is pleased to raise up a
sigh and a cry in the soul, and to cause supplications to go up out
of the heart. But this is hard work, because it seems as though
we ought to have done this before. Conscience begins to say,
"Why, you only pray to God when you want Him; you ought not
to have murmured and repined; you ought not to have rebelled
and fretted as you have done. How can you expect God to hear
you now? You have tried all you could to creep out of it, and get
the yoke off your neck; and not being able to do it, then you
come to the Lord."

Yet this is what we are obliged to do; and I may add, what grace
enables us to do, because trials in themselves will not raise up
prayer; they rather crush it. We might be in the very belly of hell,
and have no prayer except God put it there into our souls. We
might have blow upon blow, stroke upon stroke, but no prayer.
Afflictions without the grace of God only stupefy, harden and
deaden. People think sometimes, "O, when I grow old, or get ill,
then I shall pray, and seek, and serve God." Why, you would find
your very illness and age would only stupefy the mind; and if you
were in pain, you would have little to think of but pain. Your very
sufferings would only harden your heart, and stop prayer instead
of encouraging it. Therefore, it is not all the afflictions we go
through which can raise up one prayer to God; they only make us
fight against Him; they only make us murmur, rebel and despair.
It must be grace in sweet operation that softens the heart in
these trials, and the Lord's pouring out upon the soul "the Spirit
of grace and supplications." The two go together, enabling us to
"cry."

And what a mercy it is, that in all our rebellion, and in spite of all
our rebellion, there is a God to go to; that though our rebellions
do and will bring a cloud upon the throne, yet they do not push
Jesus off the throne. Whatever darkness, whatever confusion
rebellion may bring upon our mind, Christ is still there. It is like a
London tog. When you Londoners in November are wrapped up in
fog and smoke, we that live in the country are perhaps enjoying
the sunshine. All your fog does not blot the blessed sun out of the
sky; he is shining upon others, if he is not shining upon you. So
spiritually. When we get into a fog, we think sometimes that the
sun will never shine again. We judge by our feelings, and the
exercises of our minds; as though now there were no Christ; as
though all He had promised were false, all His mercy had failed,
and there was no longer anything for the soul to rest upon.

But how blessed it is in these seasons to find a little submission

and prayer; a sighing, looking, longing, hungering, thirsting,
waiting upon the Lord! This is what we must do; and what we
shall do, if grace be in our hearts; for without it, we cannot
expect any relief.

The Lord works generally thus. He brings afflictions, and lets us

feel what we are in our carnal mind under the cross to humble us
and prove us. He then raises up and draws forth a spirit of prayer
in the soul; and then He answers and blesses. The very power to
pray is a gleam of light upon the soul; the very pouring out of the
heart brings a relief; the very sight of Christ upon his throne
dispels the rebellion that works in the carnal mind. The very
coming to Him as filled with all grace; the very looking unto Him,
interceding for us as our Advocate with the Father, seems to
drive away the clouds of darkness and rebellion. It may not be,
indeed it is not a complete deliverance, but it is deliverance from
rebellion and murmuring. To pour out the heart before God brings
a measure of relief, as Hannah and Hezekiah found. If it fill not
the soul with joy and peace, at least it brings it out of that
stupefied state in which it was sunk through rebellion; it softens
the heart which before was hard; it thaws the spirit which before
was frozen; it communicates contrition where before there was
little else but hardness and desperation. And thus, the very power
given to the soul to seek, supplicate, cry, beg and pray, though it
may not bring deliverance from the trial itself, yet is a help and
encouragement enabling it to bear up. A praying soul will in due
time be a praising soul. He that seeks shall find; he that asks
shall receive. "To him that knocketh, it shall be opened." The Lord
has given many sweet promises to those that seek His face.

It is not only a mercy to have a God to go to, but to have a heart

to go to Him. It is an inestimable favour not only to have a throne
of grace, but to have grace to go to the throne. It is not only a
blessing that there is a mercy seat, but that there is mercy
reaching the heart to bring us there. And when there is this real
heartfelt cry, then in due time comes a blessed, gracious answer;
which brings us to our fourth and last point;

IV.—And that is, the healing of the waters. Now, in the healing
of the waters, we may observe certain marked steps. "The Lord,"
we read, "showed Moses a tree, which when he had cast into the
waters, the waters were made sweet."

1. The first thing to consider is, "the tree." I need not say what
this signifies. Your hearts have pronounced it already. It is the
tree of life—the cross of the Lord Jesus Christ. This is the tree; for
"Cursed is every one that hangeth on a tree." "He bare our sins in
His own body on the tree." This is the tree—the tree of life; the
cross of Jesus; salvation through blood; pardon through the
atonement which He made upon Calvary's tree; reconciliation
through the offering which He there once offered; for "by one
offering He hath perfected for ever them that are sanctified."

2. But this tree was shown to Moses. It was there before; but
Moses knew it not. It needed to be revealed to his eyes and
heart. The tree was standing there before Moses saw it. So with
us. The cross of Christ is the same, whether hidden from our eyes
or not. If we are God's children, we are even now reconciled,
pardoned, accepted, saved. Our salvation is already
accomplished; the work is finished; everlasting righteousness has
been brought in; Christ has saved us from the wrath to come.
"Who hath saved us, and called us."

But what we want is a discovery of this tree to our soul. It does

not say that God created the tree for the first time; but that he
"showed" it to Moses. He took the veil off Moses' eyes and heart,
and showed him the tree. And what is this but a blessed
revelation to the soul of the cross of the Lord Jesus Christ; seeing
Him by the eye of faith as the Lamb of God slain from before the
foundation of the world; a viewing Him by the eye of faith
suspended as it were between earth and heaven, accomplishing
our salvation by His own precious blood?

Now in all our murmuring, rebellion and fretfulness we do not see

this. It is hidden from our eyes; and we have no union, no
communion then with a suffering Lord. If we could go to the
cross, clasp it in our embrace, lay hold of a crucified Jesus, feel
sweet communion with Him, gaze upon His sufferings, and see
that face which was marred more than the sons of men, it would
thaw away the rebellion, it would remove the murmuring, it
would melt the heart down into contrition, brokenness, and love.
But we cannot see it; we only see our disappointments, our
vexations, losses, crosses and sorrows. The mind is so wrapped
up in darkness; there is such a fog over the soul that we can only
"grope for the wall like the blind." We think ourselves hardly dealt
with, wonder that God should be so unkind, and have no eyes or
heart to look beyond all these things, and to see the Lord Jesus
Christ reconciling us to God, and bearing our sins and sorrows in
His own body on the tree. And therefore, we need it to be shown
to us; we need the blessed Spirit to take of the things of Christ,
and reveal them to our soul; to bring into our hearts a sight and
sense of the bleeding Lamb, of the suffering "Man of Sorrows," of
the crucified Immanuel.

3. But there is another step. It was not sufficient that there

should be a tree, nor enough to show Moses the tree. The tree
must be cast into the waters. The boughs of the tree might
overshadow the streams; that did not heal them. Those too that
stood on the banks of the stream might gaze upon the tree; that
did not heal the waters. A further process was necessary. There
was another step to be taken; and that was, the tree was to be
cast into the waters. And does this not signify spiritually the
bringing in of the cross of Christ into the soul; the revelation of a
crucified Saviour to the heart; the manifestation of Jesus in His
sufferings and blood to the conscience; and this, by bringing the
cross of Christ into the soul, as the tree was cast into the waters?
Now nothing but this can heal the waters. But when the tree was
cast into the waters, when it sank, and the waters covered in,
then they were made sweet; their bitterness was taken away,
and they could be safely drunk.

Let us apply this. I have endeavoured to show you what these

waters are, and how they were made bitter; and I must therefore
just cast my mind's eye a little back, to show you how they are
made sweet.

1. Now there are many things that are vexatious and

disappointing in our daily calling. You have many things in
business very plaguing, very trying. You cannot, therefore, take
that pleasure in it which worldly men can; or if it much occupy
your mind, you find guilt resting upon your conscience; you
cannot take, as it were, a good draught of your worldly
occupation, drink it down and enjoy it; but there is some
disappointment, or some guilt of conscience connected with it,
that when you would fain take pleasure in it, you cannot succeed.
Well, how is this to be sweetened? If there be some discovery to
your soul of a precious Jesus, and you be indulged with some
knowledge of, and communion with a suffering Immanuel, does
not that sweeten to you your daily occupation? Does it not
sanctify the meanest employment? Yes: sanctify it! Why, a man
may be a sc, avenger, a chimney sweep, a nightman, and if he
have the grace of God in his heart, the visitations of the Lord's
presence and the bedewings of His love and favour will make this
calling a holy calling, aye, much more a holy calling than many a
bishop preaching in lawn sleeves, or a priest bowing before the
altar. Aye, a poor old washerwoman, rubbing her stockings over
her tub, may be worshipping God in spirit and in truth, and have
her soul filled with happiness and holiness, when surpliced
choristers and Puseyite priests are mocking him with lies and
hearts full of uncleanness. Thus, washing stockings may be a
holier employment than chanting psalms. It is not church or
chapel that makes us holy, but the blessed Spirit making our
bodies His temple.

2. Or you may almost constantly have bad health, which may

be your daily cross; and when the Lord does not favour you with
His presence, a very hard cross it is to carry. But suppose the
Lord is pleased to bless your soul, lead you to Jesus, give you
communion with Him, show you the sufferings of "the Man of
Sorrows," and that you are interested in His precious blood and
love—is not the bitter water sweetened? Can you not then bear
your aches, pains and infirmities? Do you even see good
springing out of your afflicted body; and would sooner have
sanctified illness than unsanctified health?

3. Or your "house," like David's, does not "grow" as you wish.

You have rebellious children, gay sons, carnal daughters,
servants that plague your life out; with other domestic things that
try your mind; and it seems as though you were always grieved
and vexed. Well now, if your soul were blessed, watered,
sanctified with some of the manifestations of the dying love and
atoning blood of the Lord Jesus Christ, do you think it would
sweeten even these waters? If you felt Jesus to be your brother,
and God your father, would you not be so swallowed up in this
spiritual relation, that you could say, "As to my worldly relatives,
my earthly ties, compared with all this, what are they? Jesus is
more precious to me than all worldly things—than husband, wife,
or children." Is not this sweetening the bitter waters?

4. Or, if sin has marred everything in your soul, made you a

wretch, given you a daily cross continually, troubles your mind,
and subjects you, as it does all the children of God, to a constant
exercise from the workings of evil in your carnal heart, and your
spirit is plagued with it day and night, what then is to sweeten
these bitter waters—these waters of Marah—but the grace of the
Lord Jesus Christ? Pardoning love, atoning blood, a sight of Jesus,
an embracing of Him as our all in all, when felt, is a casting of the
tree of life into the bitter waters; and when the tree is cast into
the bitter waters, they are healed. Now you can drink; you can
attend to your lawful calling; you may go about your daily duties;
you can enjoy your family and home relationships; aye, and have
sweetness in your soul amidst all your sins and sorrows, when
you realise anything of this grace of the Lord Jesus Christ as
sweetening every bitter draught.

5. But there is one draught to come, which in bitterness exceeds

all, and that is, the bitter draught of death. How is that bitter
water to be sweetened? Die you must, and none know how soon.
We know not the circumstances of our death—what long illness,
what pain, langour, or suffering may attend it; or what the state
of our minds may be when death seems to draw near and hold us
in his grasp. This is a bitter draught, and how is it to be
sweetened? By looking back to a well-spent life? By thinking of
the duties you have discharged, the very religious part you have
played, your being a member of a Christian church, having
attended a certain chapel, prayed and read, and so on? Why all
these things, if only these, would but embitter the draught more,
because you would say, "I have been all this, and done all this,
and where is my poor soul now?" Nothing but the casting in of
the tree of life, the cross of the Lord Jesus Christ into these bitter
waters can sweeten them. Many saints—all saints, I may say in
their degree—have found these bitter waters sweetened; and
though they shrank from the draught, yet when it touched their
lips it went down like honey; it was sweetened by the
manifestations of the Lord Jesus Christ, and the shedding abroad
in their soul of His dying love.

Now, do you not see how needful it is, to find the waters bitter,
that you may have them sweetened? Suppose you were to go
through life with no bitterness, no sorrows, no disappointments,
no vexations, no temptations, no exercises, might you not drink
of these waters till you burst?

There might have been even a temporal mercy to the children of

Israel in finding these waters bitter. If, after wandering three
days in the wilderness, they had found them sweet, they might
have drunk of them so immoderately as to have injured them,
and perhaps fatally; there might therefore have been a mercy
even in the embittering of the waters before they were
sweetened. The water having being bitter, they would drink
cautiously for fear of the bitterness returning. Well, so spiritually.
If you were to have your own way, your own will, and enjoy what
your nature cleaves to, what would you be? What sort of a
Christian would you be? Where would be the love of God in your
soul? Where would there be any experience either of mercy or
judgment? Where any sighs or cries? Where any praises or
blessings? You would live and die without God. But when
everything is embittered by sin or sorrow, and the Lord does not
let us do what we would, but mars all sources of earthly
happiness, then we fain turn to Him. And when He is pleased to
drop a little measure of His grace and mercy into the soul, then
these bitter waters are sweetened and healed; and you may drink
safely of them.

And there is no other way. You may try a thousand ways; you
may attempt to doctor the waters; put sugar, honey, treacle into
them; you may try your best. These waters cannot be sweetened
by treacle or honey; they can be sweetened only by the tree of
life, the cross of Jesus, the manifestation of dying love, the
application of atoning blood. Nothing short of this—nothing but
this, can ever heal the bitterness; and to disguise the taste will
only eventually make the bitter taste more bitter still.

Then, it is your mercy to have your daily draught of bitters; to

find life embittered, health embittered, family embittered,
business embittered, your own soul embittered; so as to lead you
to say, "Call me not Naomi, but Marah; for the Almighty hath
dealt very bitterly with me."

It is your mercy to be a "Marah," or a Hannah. It is a mercy to

weep bitter tears, to have bitterness of soul, and many griefs and
exercises, when they lead us to see and feel that there is only
one thing which can sweeten our trials, the cross of the Lord
Jesus Christ, under the teaching of God, to embrace and cleave to
that, and not be satisfied without its sweet enjoyment and
blessed manifestation.
The Benefits and Blessings of Union with Christ

Preached at North Street Chapel, Stamford, on Lord's Day

Morning, Dec. 7, 1862

"But of him are ye in Christ Jesus, who of God is made unto us

wisdom, and righteousness, and sanctification, and redemption;
that, according as it is written, he that glorieth, let him glory in
the Lord." 1 Cor. 1:30, 31

The sovereignty of God is a great deep—a deep so profound as to

be absolutely unfathomable by the human intellect. Unable,
therefore, or unwilling to believe what they cannot comprehend,
men have denied the sovereignty of God, and sought, with feeble
hands, to wrest the sceptre of omnipotence out of the grasp of
the mighty Lord of heaven and earth, the great and glorious
Arbiter of all events and Disposer of all circumstances, who
"doeth according to his will in the army of heaven and among the
inhabitants of the earth, so that none can stay his hand, or say
unto him, What doest thou?" (Dan. 4:35.) But because we cannot
comprehend the sovereignty of God, is it less real? Can we
comprehend any one perfection of that great and glorious Being,
"who dwelleth in the light which no man can approach unto,
whom no man hath seen or can see?" Can we comprehend, for
instance, his eternal existence? Is our intellect able to fathom
that profound mystery, that there is a glorious, self-existent
Being, who from all eternity is, according to his own declaration
of himself, "I AM that I AM?" Our mind is lost in the
contemplation of an eternal, self-existent Being; and yet to deny
it is atheism. What shall we say too of his omnipresence?—that
he fills all time and all space, so that wherever we are there God
is. Can the mind of man fathom a presence that spreads itself, so
to speak, in every place, and yet is but one God? Or view his
omniscience—that he reads with one glance the hearts of millions
of men. Can we fathom that perfection of the Almighty? And yet
dare we deny it when our own conscience assures us that all
things are naked and open before the eyes of him with whom we
have to do? Or look again at his omnipotence—that the same
hands which formed the sun, that glorious orb of light, created
the crawling worm and the slimy snail. Are we not lost when we
attempt to bring the powers of our reason to bear upon any one
of the infinite perfections of Jehovah? To all such vain reasoners
who attempt to measure God by the line of human intellect, and
presumptuously reject what they cannot understand, we may well
apply the keen language of Zophar: "Canst thou by searching find
out God, canst thou find out the Almighty unto perfection? It is as
high as heaven; what canst thou do? deeper than hell; what
canst thou know? The measure thereof is longer than the earth,
and broader than the sea." And to all who would attempt to
comprehend what is incomprehensible, we may well apply his
pungent description of what man really is, with all his attempts to
introduce his earthly wisdom into heavenly mysteries: "Vain man
would be wise, though man be born like a wild ass's colt." (Job
11:7-9.)

But these proud reasoners, who bring everything to the bar of

human intellect, are not the only persons who deny the
sovereignty of God. There is a generation of men, and a
numerous generation too, who, because the sovereignty of God
militates against their favourite doctrine of creature agency—
what is commonly called "free will"—fight against it with
desperate enmity. They clearly see that the sovereignty of God
cuts up by the very roots their darling dogma, and that a God
who is the sovereign Disposer of all events sadly interferes with
the liberty of man to do what he pleases and be what he wills.
They would sooner, therefore, give up the sovereignty of God
than the free agency of man; and rather than allow God to be the
Governor of his own world, they would put every circumstance
under the dominion of blind chance, and a confused raffle of luck
and fortune. But whether men deny it, or whether men dispute it,
it matters not: neither their denial nor their contention will alter
the solemn fact that God reigns supreme; that "he sitteth upon
the circle of the earth, and the inhabitants thereof are as
grasshoppers." (Isai. 40:22.) But the child of grace, who is under
divine teaching, whatever may have been his strong prejudices
against, or his violent opposition to scripture truth in the days of
his ignorance, is brought sooner or later to see and acknowledge
the sovereignty of God; and, when he is led into the mystery,
receives it as a most blessed truth. In fact, as the Lord the Spirit
is pleased to enlighten the eyes of his understanding, he sees the
sovereignty of God in everything. If he look at creation, he sees
there a sovereign hand which fixed the sun in the sky and made
the day-spring know its place. If he look at himself, he sees and
feels that a sovereign power called him into birth and being; that
he had no control over his own coming into his present time and
state, no choice who should be his parents, what the
circumstances of his birth, what situation he should occupy,
whether of peer or of peasant, or where his lot be cast among the
children of men. Over these circumstances, which affect the
whole of his life, he feels that he had no more control than he had
over the creation of the sun, or of "the seven stars and Orion"
(Amos 5:8); and that free will had no more name or place in the
disposal of any one of these events on earth than it had of those
in heaven. But as his eye is opened to see the sovereign hand of
God in fixing and determining the circumstances of his earthly
being, he sees how all was arranged by infinite wisdom and
executed by infinite power. And when he comes to the
department of grace, and can with believing eye trace out the
dealings of God with his soul, then, in a more conspicuous
manner still, does the sovereignty of God beam upon his heart;
for well he knows that free will had no place there, and that "it
was not of him that willeth or of him that runneth, but of God
that showeth mercy." How plainly he sees and feels that it was
sovereign grace which first arrested him on his downward course;
that it was sovereign grace which made him feel the burden of
sin; that it was sovereign grace which put a cry and a sigh into
his soul; that it was sovereign grace which brought him to the
footstool of mercy; that it was sovereign grace which revealed
the Saviour, and applied the message of mercy and peace to his
heart. Thus what some deny and others dispute, he is brought to
receive in the simplicity of faith, as most glorifying to God and
suitable to man; and as he receives it, he admires it, adores it,
and submits to it.
But you may say, "What has all this to do with your text? We fully
see with you in your description of the sovereignty of grace, and
we believe it to be the truth: but what has this to do with the
words from which you intend to speak this morning?" To this I
answer, "Much every way. The sovereignty of God is stamped
upon our text in living letters of light." "The sovereignty of God in
the text?" you say; "I see no sovereignty mentioned there." No,
not the word; but the thing is there if the word be absent; and I
have to deal with things and facts, not bare words. Thus I can see
the sovereignty of God stamped upon our text in the broadest
characters. I see it first in the expression "Of him are ye in Christ
Jesus." What but sovereignty is fully implied, if not positively
expressed, in the declaration that it is "of God that the saints are
in Christ Jesus?" for if it be wholly and solely "of God," it is wholly
and solely of the sovereignty of God. Did the saints of God at
Corinth put themselves into Christ Jesus, or did God put them?
And if God put them into Christ, so as to give them a standing in
him, and a union with him, what was that but an act of divine
sovereignty? But I see it also in the declaration which the apostle
has made in the same text, that Christ Jesus "of God is made
unto us wisdom, and righteousness, and sanctification, and
redemption;" for was it not as much an act of God's sovereign
grace and power to make Christ Jesus to be to us and for us all
these divine and heavenly blessings, as to give us a union with
him? Could we, could any, have made him to be all this unto us?
Did we devise the plan? Did we carry it into execution? Did we
raise up Christ from the dead? Did we set him at God's right hand
in the heavenly places, and make him head over all things to the
Church? Is not the whole of this, first and last, of the sovereign
will and gracious execution of the God of all grace? Well does the
apostle sum up the whole: "Blessed be the God and Father of our
Lord Jesus Christ, who hath blessed us with all spiritual blessings
in heavenly places in Christ."

Having thus laid a broad and scriptural foundation for the truth of
God, as set forth in our text to stand upon, I shall now, with his
help and blessing, direct your mind chiefly to these three points,
which you will find clearly revealed in it.
I.—First, the union which the saints of God have with Christ
Jesus, as declared in the words, "But of him are ye in Christ
Jesus."

II.—Secondly, the benefits and blessings which spring out of this

personal union with Christ Jesus: that he "of God is made unto
them wisdom, and righteousness, and sanctification, and
redemption."

III.—Thirdly, what is the fruit of all these heavenly blessings?

Praising and blessing the name of the Lord for what he is in
himself, and for what he is to his people. "That according as it is
written, He that glorieth, let him glory in the Lord."
I.—I have first, then, with God's help, to show you the union
which the saints of God have with Christ Jesus. This union is the
source and foundation of every spiritual blessing: in fact, we may
broadly say, without this union with Christ, of spiritual blessing
there is none.

i. But, in order clearly to trace out the foundation of this union

with Christ, we must revert for a few moments to that grand and
glorious truth which I just now brought before you in my
introduction—I mean the sovereignty of God; for you will observe
that the apostle does not speak as if we gave ourselves this union
with Christ Jesus, if indeed we are possessed of it; but he takes it
up to a higher source, and ascribes it to a more glorious and
exalted will than that which can dwell in a mutable creature's
breast. "Of him," he declares, "are ye in Christ Jesus." As these
words are full of heavenly truth, and form indeed the grand and
solid basis on which the text is built, let us see, as the Lord may
enable, how this union—for union is declared by the expression
"in Christ Jesus"—is of God.

1. It is, then, first of the purpose of God. Whatever God does, he

does in harmony with his eternal purposes. This in Scripture is
sometimes called "the counsel of his own will." "Who worketh all
things," says Paul, "after the counsel of his own will." (Ephes.
1:11.) To the same effect the apostle speaks in the words,
"Having made known unto us the mystery of his will, according to
his good pleasure which he hath purposed in himself;" and in
similar language he expresses himself, "Who hath saved us, and
called us with an holy calling, not according to our works, but
according to his own purpose and grace, which was given us in
Christ Jesus before the world began." But still more plainly, if
possible, and clearly does he lay down the same solemn truth
where he says, "having predestinated us unto the adoption of
children by Jesus Christ to himself, according to the good
pleasure of his will." Now, if we put together these passages, we
shall see in them all the sovereignty of God's will, and that this
will determined itself in certain fixed purposes. Thus, whether we
speak of the "good pleasure of his will," or the "counsel of his
own will," or his "good pleasure which he hath purposed in
himself," or "his own purpose and grace," we still come to the
same point, the sovereignty and supremacy of the will of God.
This, therefore, we must lay down as a foundation truth, that the
will of God must be supreme, and being supreme, can never
meet with any disappointment or defeat. No creature in heaven
and no creature upon earth can ever stand before the execution
of God's will. No creature in heaven could or would do so, for his
will is there perfectly obeyed; and whatever opposition any
creature upon earth may raise against it, his will must triumph
over all, as he says, "Who would set the briars and thorns against
me in battle? I would go through them, I would burn them
together." (Isaiah 27:4.) It was, then, of this eternal will of God
that his people should have a union with the Son of his love.

2. But this union of the Church with his dear Son was not only
according to the will and purpose of God, for that will and that
purpose embrace all events and circumstances; but it was also of
the love of God. I have often been struck with an expression of
our blessed Lord in his intercessory prayer, "And hast loved them
as thou hast loved me." (John 17:23.) What a view does this give
us of the love of God to his people, that he loved them with the
same love as that with which he loved his only begotten Son! But
we must bear in mind that this love to them was only in the Son
of his love. This, therefore, made our Lord say, "that the love
wherewith thou hast loved me may be in them and I in them."
(John 17:26.)
3. But not only was God's sovereignty displayed in the good
pleasure of his will and his everlasting love, but also in the
execution of his eternal purposes; for the good pleasure of his will
can only be made known by its execution. In pursuance,
therefore, of his eternal purpose and in the flowing forth of his
eternal love, he gave his people a union with Christ. This is
beautifully expressed by our gracious Lord: "I have manifested
thy name unto the men which thou gavest me out of the world;
thine they were and thou gavest them me;" and, again, "They are
thine, and all mine are thine and thine are mine, and I am
glorified in them." (John 17:6, 9, 10.)

4. But this sovereignty is to be made known in manifestation, as

well as in purpose and execution; for the will of God is secret to
us until it flows down the stream of time and is made known to
our heart by a divine and heavenly power. Thus there is not only
an eternal union with Christ Jesus in the purpose of God and in
the gift of his people to him, before time began to run its course,
but there is a spiritual and living union built upon it and flowing
out of it, which is given to the soul when it is regenerated by the
power of God's grace. The apostle tells us that "the God and
Father of our Lord Jesus Christ hath blessed his people with all
spiritual blessings in heavenly places in Christ." (Eph. 1:3.) But
these spiritual blessings depend upon and flow out of union with
Christ, which made the apostle say, "According as he hath chosen
us in him before the foundation of the world." Now, amongst
these spiritual blessings, the greatest is a spiritual union with
Christ, for in that is contained every other. Whatever then be the
purposes of God, or whatever eternal union a man may have with
Christ, he has no spiritual union until he has been made a
partaker of his Spirit; for "if any man have not the Spirit of Christ
he is none of his" (Rom. 8:9); and, again, "He that is joined to
the Lord is one Spirit." (1 Cor. 6:17.) We thus see that the saints
of God are in Christ Jesus, not only in the original purpose of
God, which forms the foundation as well as the source of every
other blessing; but that they are also "in Christ Jesus" by the
execution of that purpose in the gift of them to be his, and also
"in Christ Jesus" by the manifestation of that union by that work
of grace upon their heart, whereby Christ is formed in them the
hope of glory.

ii. But we have in Scripture four sweet and most expressive

figures whereby this union with Christ, as a vital, experimental
reality, is set forth. They all tend to the same point; they all
preach the same doctrine; they all unfold the same experience;
indeed, they are so graciously and divinely constructed, that each
serves to illustrate and confirm the other. I shall, therefore, in
endeavouring this morning to trace out more plainly and clearly
the nature and effects of this heavenly union, bring forward these
four figures, that we may gather from them not only a clearer
view of what this union is in itself, but may also gather up some
encouraging testimony that we are personal partakers of it.

1. The first figure which I shall bring forward is that which our
most gracious Lord employed when he said to his disciples, "I am
the vine, ye are the branches." (John 15:5.) Here the Lord sets
forth the union which the Church has with him by the figure of a
tree, and the branches which are in it and grow out of it. Now, if
you look at a tree, and especially at a vine, you will observe in a
moment that the branches have no life, or growth, or indeed any
being out of the stem; that they never were possessed of any
independent existence; that they grew out of the stem, and had
no being but what they had in union with it. Look at this point
again. Set before the eyes of your mind the stem of a vine as first
planted against a wall. What do you see? A solitary stem. But
look a little closer: you will now see peeping out of the bark on
each side of the stem little buds from top to bottom. Now, as
spring advances and the sap flows, mark what follows. First, the
bud swells; then it elongates itself into a branch; then as the
season advances the branch becomes clothed with leaves, and
flowers, and fruit. But whether bud, or branch, or clothed with
leaves, flowers, or fruit, it had no existence independent of its
existence in the stem. Its being was originally in the stem, and it
was gradually evolved out of it through the communication of the
life and sap which were in the stem out of which it came. So it is
with the members of Christ: they have no independent existence
out of him. Our blessed Lord, therefore, himself says, "Without
me," or, as it is in the margin, "severed from me," ye can do
nothing. Thus, without a union with Christ, we have no spiritual
existence; and we may boldly say that we no more have a
spiritual being in the mind of God independent of Christ, than the
branch of a tree has an independent existence out of the stem in
which it grows. But you will observe, also, in this figure of the
vine and the branches, how all the fruitfulness of the branch
depends upon its union with the vine. Whatever life there is in the
branch, it flows out of the stem; whatever strength there is in the
branch, it comes from its union with the stem; whatever foliage,
whatever fruit, all come still out of its union with the stem. And
this is the case, whether the branch be great or small. From the
stoutest limb of a tree to the smallest twig, all are in union with
the stem and all derive life and nourishment from it. So it is in
grace: not only is our very being, as sons and daughters of the
Lord Almighty, connected with our union with Christ, but our well-
being. All our knowledge, therefore, of heavenly mysteries, all
our faith, all our hope, and all our love—in a word, all our grace,
whether much or little, whether that of the babe, the child, the
young man, or the father, flows out of a personal, spiritual, and
experimental union with the Lord Jesus; for we are nothing but
what we are in him, and we have nothing but what we possess by
virtue of our union with him.

2. Now take another figure which the Holy Ghost has employed
and sanctified to the same divine use—that of a building of which
the Lord Jesus Christ is the foundation, and his people living
stones built upon him. This figure is very beautifully brought
forward by the apostle where, speaking of the saints, he says,
that they "are built upon the foundation of the apostles and
prophets, Jesus Christ himself being the chief corner stone; in
whom all the building fitly framed together groweth unto an holy
temple in the Lord: in whom ye also are builded together for an
habitation of God through the Spirit." You will observe that the
people of God are spoken of here, as "built upon the foundation
of the apostles and prophets"—that is, the foundation which they
laid, but that Jesus Christ himself is "the chief corner stone;" and
they are represented as growing into a holy temple in him. From
this figure we gather two things, first, that this union is a union of
support, and, secondly, a union also of living and spiritual
influence. For our blessed Lord is spoken of as "the corner stone,"
which is that stone on which the whole weight of the building
rests. And as the saints "grow into a holy temple in Christ," it
implies a communication of divine life, for life and growth always
go together. But the apostle Peter opens up this figure in a still
more clear and blessed way, where he says, "To whom coming,
as unto a living stone, disallowed indeed of men, but chosen of
God, and precious, ye also, as lively stones, are built up a
spiritual house, a holy priesthood, to offer up spiritual sacrifices,
acceptable to God by Jesus Christ." (1 Pet. 2:4, 5.) The words
"lively stones" should have been translated "living stones," for it
is in the original exactly the same word as is translated a "living
stone" in the preceding verse; and I hardly know why our
translators made an alteration which has rather obscured the
meaning. Now what a wonderful difference there is between a
building such as we this morning are assembled in, of which the
stones are dead stones and the foundation a dead foundation,
and that heavenly building which "groweth up into a holy temple
for the habitation of God." In this spiritual house, this glorious
temple, built for eternity, the foundation is a living foundation,
and the stones built upon it and in union with it are living stones.
Thus not only does every living stone rest upon the foundation as
its only support, but from this corner stone which bears it up and
on which it leans with all its weight, there flows a stream of
heavenly life which diffuses itself into every stone of the spiritual
building, of whatever size it be, or whatever part it occupy; and
the more heavily and the more closely that each stone presses
upon the foundation, the more does life flow into it. Thus to be
built upon Christ is not merely to rest upon him as the
foundation, as stones do in a literal building, but so to rest upon
him that a sensible communication of his grace may flow into
every living stone in union with it. Look at this in an experimental
point of view. If the grace of God be in your heart, there will be a
resting upon the Person of the Lord Jesus Christ. You will be
leaning upon him with all the weight of your sins and sorrows;
and the more heavily they press you down the more you will lean
upon him. Now you will find just in proportion as you lean upon
him that there will be a communication of life out of his fulness to
your soul; and as this is more and more opened up to your heart
there will be a more exclusive resting upon him in every doubt
and difficulty, in every trial and temptation, for you will find that
you cannot bear your troubles alone, for "Woe to him that is
alone when he falleth." (Eccl. 4:10.) And you will also find that
when you can cease from all exertions and all strivings of your
own, and clasp him round in faith, as the stone embraces the
foundation, there will be a communication out of his fulness to
maintain in active exercise every grace of the spirit in your heart.

3. But take another figure, for I wish to open up this subject as

the Scriptures have laid it down—that of the head and members.
This we find very clearly spoken of by the apostle, both in the
Epistle to the Ephesians and in that to the Colossians. I shall take
the latter, as the more clear: "Not holding the Head, from which
all the body by joints and bands having nourishment ministered,
and knit together, increaseth with the increase of God." (Col.
2:19.) Here the blessed Lord is represented as the Head, and his
people as the members of his mystical body. Now we know what
an intimate union the members of our body have with the head
and with each other, and that, as I pointed out in the case of the
vine, our bodily members never had an independent existence;
they never subsisted out of union with the head and with each
other. So it is in grace: the saints of God, viewed as saints of
God, never had any subsistence except in union with the Son of
God. In him they were chosen, as the apostle declares,
"According as he hath chosen us in him." In him they are
"accepted" (Eph. 1:6); in him they obtained their inheritance.
(Eph. 1:11.) But we must bear in mind that as no figure can
adequately set forth the mystery of union with Christ, so this
figure of Head and members falls short of the divine reality
shadowed forth therein. Our literal head does not differ from our
members in nature or substance; but Christ, our glorious Head,
widely differs from us, as being the eternal Son of God, one with
the Father and the Holy Ghost in the unity of the divine Essence.
He, therefore, as our spiritual Head, is more to us spiritually than
our head to our body naturally, as being everything to us; for we
derive from him all our life and all our fruitfulness. As our Head,
he is not only over us to rule and govern, but to communicate to
us out of his own fulness every spiritual gift and grace. But this
communication is only by virtue of a close, intimate, and vital
union with him. Thus everything which makes us and manifests
us as saints of God, is derived from a union with him as close as
that which our members have with our literal and natural head.
Where are our eyes but in our head? our ears but in our head?
our smell, our taste, our speech but in our head? Whence all our
powers of thought, reflection, memory, or movement? Do not all
centre in, all flow from our head? Such is Christ as "Head over all
things to the church, which is his body, the fulness of him that
filleth all in all." (Eph. 1:22, 23.)

4. But there is another figure also which the Holy Ghost has
employed to set forth this vital union between Christ and his
Church—that of man and wife, who have one flesh, one name,
one interest, and one affection, the closest of all possible unions
between persons naturally distinct. Thus the apostle, exhorting
husbands to love their wives, and quoting the ancient declaration
that "a man shall leave his father and mother and shall be joined
unto his wife, and they two shall be one flesh," adds, "This is a
great mystery, but I speak concerning Christ and the Church."
(Eph. 5:32.) She is, therefore, called the Lamb's wife (Rev.
19:7); and the holy city, New Jerusalem, a type of the Church in
its triumphant state, is said to be "prepared as a bride, adorned
for her husband." (Rev. 21:2.) Upon this figure is built the whole
of the Song of Solomon; and in many passages in the Old
Testament does the Lord speak of his Church as being
"betrothed" to him in that closest and tenderest of all unions, as,
for instance, in Hosea, "I will betroth thee unto me for ever;" and
again, "It shall be at that day saith the Lord that thou shalt call
me Ishi (that is, my husband), and shall call me no longer Baali,"
that is my Lord or master. (Hosea 2:16.) This union stands in two
things, a participation of the same nature whereby the Lord
partakes of her flesh, and a participation of his Spirit whereby she
is baptized into a spiritual union with him.

Now these four figures the Holy Ghost has made use of to set
forth the union which the saint of God has with Christ Jesus; and
though they differ from each other, yet one common idea runs
through the whole—that of a union of a most intimate and
indissoluble nature, designed, executed, and manifested as the
result of infinite wisdom, love, and grace, and the only source
and fountain of everything that can make us holy and happy both
for time and eternity.

iii. But the question may arise, How are we brought to realize our
knowledge of a personal interest in this union? It is not seeing it
in the word, or assenting to it as a grand and glorious truth, that
will give us any scriptural evidence of a personal interest in it. We
must have the witness of the Spirit to our spirit that we are the
children of God, and especially the Spirit of adoption to call God,
Abba, Father. This is being baptised with the Holy Ghost into the
same Spirit with Christ. As, then, you are thus made to drink into
one Spirit with the Lord, and he is pleased to reveal his Person
and work, blood and love, grace and glory to your soul, it gives
you a sensible evidence, and I may say the highest and greatest
of all evidences, of your eternal union with him. How does the
branch of a tree know, so to speak, or rather manifest its union
with the stem? By receiving sap out of the stem, flowing into its
tissues and fibres, and clothing it with leaves and flowers and
fruit. How does the stone, so to speak, know its union with the
foundation? By constantly leaning upon it and feeling the support
which it gives, and the strength which it communicates. How do
the members of the body know their union with the head? By
being directed by it, acting in obedience to it, and being
continually influenced by it. How does the wife know her union
with her husband? By looking back to the day on which the
marriage knot was tied, and knowing that that was the means
whereby they were made one flesh. So it is in grace. We have to
know our union with Christ by its sensible effects; by the
experimental communication of his Spirit, as in the vine; of his
support, as in the foundation; of his life and influence, as in the
head; and of his love and presence, as in the husband. Thus if in
him we live, as the branch in the vine; if on him we lean, as the
stone on the foundation; if in him we move, as the member in the
head; and if in him we embrace in love and affection, as the wife
the husband—that will be the clearest evidence of our union with
him.

But this union is not always thus clear to the saint of God. There
may be a real union, and yet, through doubt and fear, from the
weakness of faith, the temptation of Satan, and the exercise of a
misgiving heart, a sense of this union may be much obscured. It
is, therefore, necessary to look at what I may call minor
evidences, signs, and tokens which the Lord has graciously given
in his word to clear up these doubts and difficulties. The grand
point of union with Christ is, as I have shown, the possession of
his Spirit; for as he is one with us by a participation of our
nature, we are one with him by a participation of his Spirit. Now,
where his Spirit is, there will be certain fruits of his indwelling
presence, for the Spirit is never without his fruits wherever he is
by his indwelling presence and power. There will be then
repentance of sin; faith in the Lord Jesus Christ; a hope in his
mercy; love to his name; the fear of God in a tender conscience;
separation from the world; a spirit of prayer; real humility of
mind and self-abasement before the Lord; there will be also at
times heavenly affections and gracious desires, a sensible
abhorrence of all evil, and a cleaving to all that is good. So that if
you cannot always or often realise your union with Christ by the
flowing in of his love and presence, and by the immediate witness
of his Spirit, you may still look at these minor evidences in your
favour, and as the Lord may enable, gather up from them a
comfortable hope that indeed you have union with the son of
God, and that he has taken possession of your heart.

II.—But I pass on now to show some of the benefits and blessings

of this union with Christ, for it is not an unfruitful union. As a
proof of this, glance for a single moment at the figures which I
have brought forward from the word of truth. Is not the union of
vine and branches a fruitful union? "So shall ye bear much fruit,"
said our Lord to his disciples. Is not the union of foundation and
living stones a fruitful union, when the result is the growing of a
holy temple to the Lord? Is not the union of head and members a
fruitful union, when life and health and every active movement of
the body are connected with it? And is not the union of husband
and wife a fruitful union, when the olive branches overspread the
table? So it is by the benefits and blessings which spring out of
this union with Christ, and by the possession and enjoyment of
them that we are able chiefly to realise the blessed fact that we
are one with him.

i. In our text, four leading benefits and blessings are declared to

arise out of our union with Christ; for the apostle declares that "of
God he is made unto us wisdom, and righteousness, and
sanctification, and redemption.

I have before pointed out that the gift of Christ to us, to be in us

and for us such a source of heavenly blessings, is as much an act
of the sovereignty of God as giving us a union with the Son of his
love. We thus see the sovereignty of God firmly fixing, and, if I
may use the expression, unalterably riveting together Christ and
the Church—giving and fixing them in Christ, and giving and
fixing Christ in them. But now let us look at these benefits in
detail, and view by the eye of faith how Christ Jesus of God is
made unto us each of these heavenly blessings.

1. First, then, he is made unto us wisdom. The Lord knows what

we are, as so deeply, so awfully sunk in the Adam fall. Adam was
wise as well as upright; but with the fall both were gone as in a
moment; for the same awful crash which broke to pieces his
innocency wrecked and ruined his wisdom, and thus he became a
fool as well as a sinner. This folly we inherit from him; for
"foolishness is bound up in the heart of a child." God, then, as
perfectly acquainted with the folly of our mind, with our wretched
ignorance and inability to find out the way of salvation, or to walk
in it when found, has mercifully and graciously given to us One in
the courts of bliss who shall be to us and for us far beyond all
that we have lost, and has therefore made him our "wisdom." "It
hath pleased the Father that in him should all fulness dwell;" and
therefore a fulness of heavenly wisdom as well of every other
divine grace; and of this wisdom he communicates out of his
fulness to his believing people. I do not like exactly to say that
his wisdom is theirs by imputation, and yet there is a sense in
which it may be called such. Take for instance the figure of head
and members. Is not our head, in a sense, wisdom for every
member of the body? Does it not bear the responsibility of every
movement, so that all the wisdom or skill which any member
possesses may be considered as being in the head? Does not the
eye guide the hands and feet? Does not the ear hear for the
whole body? Does not the brain think and the tongue speak for
every member? Thus we see naturally that all our wisdom lies in
our head, and the wisdom of our head is put to the account of all
the members. So, spiritually, all our heavenly wisdom is in our
covenant Head. The people of God see and feel their ignorance
and folly; their inability to guide their own feet into the way of
truth and peace. Their daily experience convinces them how
easily they are entangled in the snares of sin and Satan; how
dark their mind, how hard their heart, how carnal their frame,
when the Lord does not communicate light, life, and power to
their souls. To remedy then and overcome these miserable evils
under which they groan and sigh, being burdened, Jesus Christ is
of God made unto them wisdom; so that when the God and
Father of the Lord Jesus Christ looks upon his dear Son in the
courts of bliss, he views him as their representative head, and
sees all the wisdom that they need stored up in his eternal
fulness. Thus, as he does not impute to them their sins because
of Christ's righteousness, so he does not impute unto them their
follies because of Christ's wisdom. "Ye are wise in Christ," says
the apostle to the Corinthians (1 Cor. 4:10)—wise by your union
with him. Now out of this wisdom which dwells in Christ without
measure, he communicates to his people. They have none of their
own. What they have is freely given to them liberally and
bountifully, without stint and without upbraiding.
But it may be as well to glance at some of the effects of this
wisdom as divinely communicated to the saints of God. To see,
then, their ruined and undone estate, and to flee from the wrath
to come; to sue for mercy; to cry for a manifestation of
pardoning love; to be thoroughly and deeply convinced that there
is no salvation by the works of the law; and to despair of being
justified by their own righteousness, ever bearing in mind the day
of death and of judgment after death, is a part of this wisdom; as
Moses cried aloud, "O that they were wise, that they understood
this; that they would consider their latter end." (Deut. 32:29.) To
look unto Jesus by the eye of faith; to see him as the Son of God,
"able to save to the uttermost all that come unto God by him;"
and to view the treasures of love and grace which are stored up
in his blood and righteousness, is also a part of this wisdom. To
depart from all evil and seek all that is good; to obey the
precepts as well as believe the promises; to walk tenderly,
cautiously, and circumspectly in the fear of God; to read and pray
and meditate; to commune with their own heart, and be ever
seeking divine teaching, is a part also of this wisdom. In fact, this
wisdom is indispensable for every right movement in heart, lip,
and life; for every good word and work; for our conduct in the
church and in the world; and for everything becoming our holy
profession. This the people of God deeply feel. Well do they know
that not a single truth can they see aright except by seeing light
in his light. Not a snare can they shun, or danger avoid, but by
his warning voice or guiding hand; not a doctrine can they
understand, not a promise believe, not a precept obey, except he
who of God is made unto them wisdom, is pleased to
communicate it to their heart. But, by looking to him, and
receiving out of his fulness supplies of divine instruction, which he
communicates to them through the word of his grace, as made
life and spirit to their hearts, they are made wise unto salvation;
and thus from their living and spiritual union with him, wisdom
flows into their bosom out of his fulness, as in the figure of the
vine, sap flows out of the stem into the branch. Thus, as he is
their wisdom representatively in the courts of bliss, being their
Counsellor and Advocate who pleads their cause, so he is their
wisdom efficiently, by the communication of this wisdom to their
hearts, for all the wisdom they have comes out of his fulness.
And he is their wisdom also, as being the end and object of all the
wisdom they possess or require, for the highest, greatest, and
best of all wisdom is to know him and the power of his
resurrection; to know experimentally the beauty and glory of his
divine Person; the efficacy of his atoning blood and of his
justifying righteousness; and, above all things, to know our
happy and eternal interest in all that he is, in all that he has to
the Church of God.

2. But he is also made of God unto them "righteousness." We

have all and each of us to stand before the bar of God; and how
can we stand there, unless we have a righteousness wherewith
the law of God shall be fully satisfied? Our own righteousness, the
Scripture declares, is "as filthy rags." In that, then, we cannot
appear before the throne of God. But our blessed Lord has
wrought out a righteousness by a full and perfect obedience to
the law which we have broken. He as thoroughly obeyed it in
thought, in word, and in action; and this righteousness is imputed
to those that believe. This is our wedding garment; this is our
justification. We have no other in which to stand before the
throne of God. But this robe of righteousness which is imputed to
those that believe is perfect, because it is the obedience of the
Son of God; and by it all that believe are justified from all things
from which we could not be justified by the law of Moses. I shall
not dwell, however, longer on this point, as it is one which I have
often brought before you, and in which, I trust, you are well
established by the grace of God. I therefore pass on to the next
heavenly blessing.

3. Of God he is made unto us "sanctification." It is a solemn

declaration of the apostle, that "without holiness no man shall see
the Lord." (Heb. 12:14.) To possess this holiness, therefore, is a
necessary and indispensable meetness for the inheritance of the
saints in light; but this meetness must be wrought in us by the
power of God's grace, for I am very sure that in ourselves of it we
have none. But see its necessity. What happiness could there be
in the courts of bliss unless we had a nature to enjoy it? Unless
we were made capable of seeing Christ as he is, and enjoying his
presence for evermore, heaven would be no heaven to us.
Nothing unclean or unholy can enter there. Sanctification,
therefore, must be wrought in us by the power of God, to make
us meet for the heavenly inheritance.
But as this is a rather important point, let us devote a few
minutes to it. The apostle declares that the Lord Jesus Christ is
"of God made unto us sanctification." Now, he is so in various
ways. He is so, first, as our federal Representative—that is, he, in
the presence of God, as the covenant head of the Church,
represents her as perfect in holiness. But he is also the source
and fountain of all sanctification; for all the holiness ever
possessed by all or any of the saints of God is received out of his
fulness. And he is their sanctification also imputatively, in that
the holiness of his nature is imputed to them; for they stand
"complete in him;" and the holiness of his human nature, with the
merit of his obedience and sufferings and blood-shedding, are put
to the account of the people of God; in which sense he is said to
have "sanctified them with his own blood." (Heb. 13:12.)

But besides this representative, imputed, and meritorious

sanctification, he is so as the root of all holiness, for it is by being
grafted into him that we partake of the root and fatness of the
olive tree. He, therefore, communicates of his Spirit and grace to
give us heavenly affections, holy desires, gracious thoughts,
tender feelings; and above all, that love whereby he is loved as
the altogether lovely. By the sanctifying operations of his Spirit,
he separates us from everything evil, plants his fear deep in the
heart, that it may be a fountain of life, to depart from the snares
of death; and works in us a conformity to his suffering image
here, that we may be conformed to his glorified image hereafter.
Thus there is a perfect and an imperfect sanctification—perfect by
imputation, imperfect in its present operations. But the one is the
pledge of the other; so that as surely as Christ now represents
his people in heaven as their holy Head, so will he eventually
bring them to be for ever with him in those abodes of perfect
holiness and perfect happiness, which are prepared for them as
mansions of eternal light and love.
4. We now approach the last blessing of which our text speaks,
"Redemption."

This word implies several things.

It implies, first, a state of captivity; for in ancient times captives

in war could only be redeemed by a price paid for their
deliverance. Thus we read again and again of the children of
Israel being "redeemed out of Egypt, out of the house of
bondage," implying their captivity under Pharaoh.

It is sometimes applied to a deliverance from death, as in the

redemption of the first-born, or of unclean animals whose neck
was to be broken unless redeemed.

And sometimes it is applied to a redemption from debt, as it was

often the practice to sell a debtor for a slave.

Now in all these three senses is Christ of God "made unto us

redemption;" from the captivity of sin, from the curse of the law,
from the awful debt which we owe to divine justice, has the
blessed Lord redeemed all who believe in his name.

Now just see, by way of retrospect, what heavenly blessings

there are for those who have a living union with the Son of God.
Everything is provided for them that shall be for their salvation
and their sanctification: not a single blessing has God withheld
that shall be for their eternal good. View them as foolish,
ignorant, unable to see the way, puzzled and perplexed by a
thousand difficulties, harassed by sin, tempted by Satan, far off
upon the sea. How shall they reach the heavenly shore? God, by
an infinite act of sovereign love, has made his dear Son to be
their "wisdom," so that none shall err so as to err fatally; none
shall miss the road for want of heavenly direction to find it or
walk in it. Their glorious Head, who is in heaven, is made of God
unto them wisdom on earth to bring them to their heavenly
inheritance. He opens up his word to their heart; he sends down
a ray of light into their bosom, illuminating the sacred page and
guiding their feet into the way of truth and peace. If they wander,
he brings them back; if they stumble, he raises them up; and
whatever be the difficulties that beset their path, sooner or later
some kind direction or heavenly admonition comes from his
gracious Majesty. Thus the wayfaring man, though a fool, does
not err in the way of life, for his gracious Lord being his "wisdom"
leads him safely along through every difficulty until he sets him
before his face in glory.

But they want a "righteousness." How can they stand before the
throne, seeing they are of and in themselves such poor, filthy,
defiled creatures? God has devised a way. His dear Son has
wrought out for them a perfect robe of righteousness; and the
Holy Spirit brings it near and clothes them with it, so that in it
they stand without spot or blemish before the throne.

But besides this they are unholy; their very nature is defiled;
they are worldly and carnal, and have no taste naturally, for
heavenly things. The blessed Lord is of God made unto them
"sanctification," to impute to them not only the holiness of his
nature, but also to send down the Holy Spirit into their bosom to
give them a new heart and a new spirit, to supply them with
heavenly graces, to raise up in their soul spiritual affections, and
adorn them with every new covenant fruit.

But again, they have sold themselves to sin and Satan; are often
in deep captivity to a body of sin and death; owe a thousand
talents, of which they cannot pay a single farthing. The Son of
God is made unto them "redemption," so as to pay off their
debts, to break off all their legal fetters, to set the prisoners free,
and bring them into the glorious liberty of the children of God.

And all those heavenly blessings are connected with, and flow out
of their union with Christ. How needful, then, it is to be able to
realise some inward sense of this union; for if we can realise our
personal interest in it, then all these blessings are ours. Can we
realise it? Do we feel it? Are we experimentally acquainted with
it? Do we know anything of the Lord Jesus Christ by any
revelation of his Person, his work, his love, his blood, and his
grace; by any teaching of his blessed Spirit; by any
communication of his light, life, and power to our heart; any
living faith in his name, any hope in his mercy, any love toward
him who is altogether lovely? As we can trace these things more
or less in our bosom, it raises up an evidence of our union with
the Son of God; and as we can trace this union more and more
clearly, then our faith rises to embrace him as of God made unto
us all these heavenly blessings. Under a deep sense of our
ignorance and folly, we go to him to be taught as our "wisdom;"
under a sense of our nakedness, we go to him for clothing as our
"righteousness;" under a knowledge of the carnality of our heart
and inability to be aught that is good, we go to him as our
"sanctification;" feeling the bondage of sin and Satan, we go to
him as our "redemption." This is making use of him; this is
receiving of his fulness; this is believing in his name unto eternal
life; and this is realising the blessedness of a personal union with
the Son of God.

III.—Now, as these things are feelingly realised, then there

comes a praising and blessing the name of God for these mercies,
and a glorying only in the Lord. "That, according as it is written,
he that glorieth, let him glory in the Lord." But where is it
written? Is it not in Jeremiah? "Let not the wise man glory in his
wisdom, neither let the mighty man glory in his might, let not the
rich man glory in his riches; but let him that glorieth glory in this,
that he understandeth and knoweth me." (Jer. 9:23, 24.) So we
are allowed to glory. But in what and in whom? Not in ourselves:
that is for ever disanulled. The Lord has purposed to pour
contempt upon all human glory, that none should glory in
himself, whatever he be or whatever he have. But when a man
has a view of the Son of God in his beauty, in his suitability, in his
heavenly grace and divine glory, then he can and may glory in
the Lord. He can say, "O what a Lord there is above! How
glorious is he in his excellency, in his suitability, and in his
blessedness; how glorious his wisdom, his righteousness, his
sanctification, and his redemption. Let my whole glory be there;
let me not take to myself a single atom of it. If I am wise, let me
give him the glory of being my wisdom; if righteous, let me give
him the glory of being my righteousness; if I have any fruit of the
Spirit, let me give him the glory of being my sanctification; if I
am redeemed from death and hell, let the glory of my redemption
be his." This is doing as God would have us to do, glorying in his
dear Son. And the Lord will bring all his people to this spot sooner
or later. He will give them such views of the effects of the fall, of
the misery of sin, and of their own helplessness; and will give
them such gracious views of his dear Son, as shall wean them
from glorying in the creature and make them glory in the Lord as
all their salvation and all their desire. It may be by a long course
of severe discipline, but the Lord will eventually bring all his
people there; for he has determined to glorify his dear Son, and
when we can thus glorify him, then we have the mind of Christ,
and are doing the will of God.
THE BLESSEDNESS OF DIVINE CHASTENING

Preached at Providence Chapel, Eden Street, London, on Tuesday

Evening, July 24, 1849.

"Blessed is the man whom thou chastenest, O Lord, and teachest

him out of thy law; That thou mayest give him rest from the days
of adversity, until the pit be digged for the wicked." Psalm 94:12,
13

What a different estimate men form of blessedness and happiness

from that which God has declared in his word to be such! If we
listen to the opinions of men about happiness, would not their
language be something to this import? 'Happiness consists in
health and strength: in an abundance of the comforts, luxuries,
and pleasures of life; in an amiable and affectionate partner; in
children healthy, obedient, and well-provided for in the world; in
a long and successful life, closed by an easy and tranquil death.' I
think a natural man would, if he did not use the very words,
express his ideas of happiness pretty much in the substance of
what I have just sketched out.

But when we come to what the Lord God Almighty has declared
to be happiness; when we turn aside from the opinions of men to
the expressed words and revealed ways of the Lord, what do we
find 'blessedness' to consist in? Who are the characters that the
unerring God of truth has pronounced to be blessed? "Blessed are
the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven; blessed are
they that mourn, for they shall be comforted; blessed are the
meek, for they shall inherit the earth; blessed are they which do
hunger and thirst after righteousness, for they shall be filled;
blessed are the merciful, for they shall obtain mercy; blessed are
the pure in heart, for they shall see God." (Matt. 5:3-11.) And
again, in the words of our text, "Blessed is the man whom thou
chastenest, O Lord, and teachest him out of thy law." These are
the unerring words of God; and by his words man will be tried. It
is not the fleeting, fluctuating opinions of worms of the earth; but
it is the unerring declaration of the only true God by which these
matters are to be decided.

In attempting, then, this evening to unfold what the Lord has

here declared to be real "blessedness," I shall,

I. First, endeavour to shew in what this blessedness consists;

"Blessed is the man whom thou chastenest, and teachest out of
thy law."

II. Secondly, why the man thus chastened and thus taught is
really blessed; "That thou mayest give him rest from the days of
adversity." And,

III. Thirdly, what is in preparation in the meantime for the

ungodly. "Until the pit be digged for the wicked."

I. First, then, let us endeavour to look at the spiritual meaning

of the words: "Blessed is the man whom thou chastenest, and
teachest out of thy law." Who is this man? He is one whom God
has taken in hand; one to whom the Lord has special purposes of
mercy; a true-born child of his heavenly Parent; for "If ye be
without chastisement, whereof all are partakers" there is no
exception, "then are ye bastards, and not sons" (Heb. 12:8). If
a man, therefore, be exempt from divine chastening, his
character is drawn as with a ray of light. He may congratulate
himself on exemption from trouble; he may say, 'there has no
evil touched me.' But his very exemption is only a proof of his
bastardy—the hand-writing of his illegitimacy. If he were a true-
born child, he would come under the rod; but not being such, he
escapes these proofs of God's eternal adoption. We may observe
this naturally. The children who are at this moment disturbing us
by their noise in the street, we do not chastise; they are none of
ours. But if you, as a parent, were to see your child making a
noise in the street, or otherwise misconducting himself, you
would bring him in and chastise him. He is your child; you are
interested in him; you cannot let him act as vagrant children do,
because he is your flesh and blood. And therefore, while you pass
the rest by, as having no concern in them, you bring your own
children under especial chastening because they are your own. It
is so spiritually. The wild vagrants, to whom the Lord has no
regard, the children of Satan, who are filling up the measure of
their iniquity, have no rod of chastisement; they are left, like
these poor ragged children, to their own ways. But the heirs of
promise, the children of the living God, those whom he is training
to be with him for ever in bliss and glory, he will not suffer to go
on in their own ways; for them he has a rod of correction.

But, we may observe in the words before us, that the Lord puts
chastening before teaching. Is there not something remarkable
in this? Why should chastening precede teaching? For this reason.
We have no ear to hear except so far as we are chastened. Take
the case I have alluded to. Your child does something wrong. Do
you instruct him first, or do you chasten him first? You chasten
him first. And then, when by means of the chastisement you have
brought him to submission, to a proper state of mind, you tell
him how wrongly he has acted. The rod smites the body before
the instruction drops into the ear. So it is spiritually. In God's
dealings with his children, he chastises first; and when by his
chastisement they have received an ear to hear, a conscience to
feel, and a heart to embrace the truth revealed to them, he drops
his instruction into their soul.

1. The Lord has various ways of chastising his people; but he

generally selects such chastisement as is peculiarly adapted to
the individual whom he chastens. What would be a very great
chastisement for you, might not be so to me; and what on the
other hand might be a very severe stroke to me might not be so
to you. Our dispositions, our constitutions, and our experiences
may all differ; and therefore that chastening is selected which is
suitable to the individual. It is as though the Lord had suspended
in his heavenly wardrobe a number of rods of different sizes; and
he takes out that very rod which is just adapted to the very child
whom he intends to chastise, inflicting it in such a measure, at a
time, and in such a way as is exactly fitted to the individual to be
chastised. And here is the wisdom of God signally displayed.
i. The Lord, for instance, sees fit to chasten some in body. We
find this in the Scriptures. In the book of Job especially it is
mentioned: "He is chastened also with pain upon his bed, and the
multitude of his bones with strong pain: so that his life abhorreth
bread, and his soul dainty meat. His flesh is consumed away that
it cannot be seen; and his bones that were not seen stick out"
(Job 33:19-21). There we have an instance of an individual laid
upon a sick bed, in pain of body, distress of mind, and chastened
by his gracious Lord for his good. So we find the Apostle Paul
speaking to the Corinthians, who had misbehaved themselves at
the Lord's supper; "For this cause many are weak and sickly
among you, and many sleep" (1 Cor. 11:30). It was their
unbecoming conduct at the Lord's supper which had brought on
them bodily sickness. The Lord chastened their body for the
misconduct of their soul. So in the case of Hezekiah, we find the
Lord took similar measures. The prophet was sent to him with
this message in his mouth, "Set thine house in order, for thou
shalt die and not live" (2 Kings 20:1). Sickness took hold of him,
and he was stretched upon the bed of death. But see how it
worked in him! "He turned his face to the wall, and prayed to the
Lord." He turned away from all human help, and fixed his eyes
wholly and solely on him who is able to save. It is in sickness and
affliction, oftentimes, that the Lord is pleased to manifest himself
to our souls, bless us with his presence, and stir up in us a spirit
of prayer. I myself am a living witness of it; the greatest
blessings I have ever had, the sweetest manifestations of the
Lord to my soul have been upon a sick bed. Illness is often very
profitable. Bodily afflictions separate us from the world, set our
hearts upon heavenly things, draw our affections from the things
of time and sense, when the Lord is pleased to manifest himself
in them. And yet there are other times and seasons when we are
laid upon a bed of sickness, and yet no blessing is given. I
remember once, after the Lord had blessed my soul upon a bed
of sickness, when I got a little better, and the blessing had worn
off, this thought crossed me, 'O, your spiritual state of mind was
not the effect of grace; you were sick and afflicted; it was that,
and not anything specially from God that brought those feelings.'
Soon after, I was laid upon a bed of sickness again; had I then
the same blessed feelings, the same views of Christ, the same
spiritual-mindedness in my soul? Quite the contrary; all was hard,
dark, dead, and barren. Then I saw that it was not the sickness
that could make Christ known, loved, or precious; but the power
of God made manifest in it. And thus, sometimes, we learn from
our very barrenness, hardness, and deadness, profitable lessons,
and are convinced thereby that we are utterly unable to raise up
one spiritual feeling in our souls.

ii. Others the Lord chastens in their families. Our children are
very near and dear to us; they are our own flesh and blood, and
touch our tenderest feelings. Now the Lord sometimes may pass
by ourselves personally, and afflict us in our children or our
partners in life. We find this in the Scriptures. We see how Jacob
suffered from his children, by losing one for a time, and others
proving thorns in his side, and a grief to his soul. We see this also
in David, when he wept out his soul with such bitter sorrow, "O
my son Absalom, my son, my son Absalom; would to God I had
died for thee, O Absalom, my son, my son!" (2 Sam. 18:33) We
see it in the case of Amnon and Tamar (2 Sam. 13). What misery
was produced by his children in his own household! We see it also
in the taking away of the child which he had by the wife of Uriah
the Hittite; which though it cut him to the very soul, yet he saw
as the chastising hand of God for his fearful transgression.

iii. Others again are chastened in their worldly circumstances.

We see this in the Scriptures also. Look at Job; a man who in
riches exceeded all the men of the East. But how in a moment all
was struck away; his flocks, his herds, and all his possessions
taken away at a stroke. Ungodly persons do not see the hand of
God in these things; it is all 'a chance' with them, or an
'unfortunate speculation, which did not succeed.' But when the
children of God enter into speculations, or embark their money in
enterprises which are not consistent; when a reverse comes, the
speculation turns out to be a failure, and the money is lost, it is
their blessing to receive it as a stroke from God and as a mark of
divine chastisement. Their eyes are then anointed with eye-salve
to see that it is a justly deserved stroke; and though it cuts them
all the more deeply, yet they receive it as from the Lord, and
submit to it as a dispensation of mercy, not of wrath.

iv. Others I may say all in their measure, the Lord afflicts
spiritually, in their souls. What I have hitherto been treating
upon are mere external afflictions—afflictions of the body, in the
family, and in circumstances. All these are the dispensations of
God, and ought to be viewed as such; and when so viewed, they
work together in the soul for good. They must not be put aside;
we must not say, 'The hand of God is not in them; it is all a
chance.' Nothing comes to a child of God as a matter of accident
or chance; it all proceeds from God, and all is dealt out in
measure and for certain purposes. If the Lord touch our bodies, it
is for our spiritual good; if he bring affliction through our children,
it is for our spiritual good; if he afflict us in our circumstances, it
is for our spiritual good. When the eye is opened to see, the ear
to hear, the heart to believe, and the conscience made tender to
feel, we know and confess that these things are sent from God.
Here is the difference between a believer and an unbeliever.
Infidelity says 'it is a chance;' for unbelief sees the hand of God in
nothing: faith says, 'it is the lord;' for faith sees the hand of God
in everything.

Now though a few may escape these outward troubles, yet there
are spiritual afflictions which we cannot and must not escape. If
we do escape them, woe be to us; we are only signing our death-
warrant; only proclaiming aloud, 'We are bastards.' If we are
God's children, we shall have spiritual afflictions; and these will
consist, proportionately to light and life in the conscience, in
painful convictions of guilt; in deep repentance and grief of soul
on account of our backslidings; in a discovery of our evil ways
and crooked actions; in sorrow for the many things we have done
which conscience bears witness against as sinful. The denial of
answers to our prayers; the shutting up of the throne of grace to
our cries; the darkness of mind that we labour under; the trying
thoughts we may have at times concerning our state, or the
dealings of God with our souls; the inability to raise up faith,
hope, and love, in our hearts—these all are to be viewed as
chastisements. Is it not so naturally? Your child has done
something wrong, and displeased you. Do you look upon him now
as kindly as at other times? No. You keep him at a distance; you
do not let him dine with you today; you abridge him perhaps a
part of his food; you make him go to bed early and in the dark;
and if you do not visit him with positive stripes, you manifest by
your reserved countenance and serious look that you are
displeased; you will not take him upon your knee, nor embrace
him like his brothers and sisters, but send him to bed without a
kiss. What are all these but marks to the child of your
displeasure? These are chastisements; and if the child be tender,
he will go sobbing to bed because his parent is displeased with
him; for he knows he has brought this displeasure upon himself.
It is so spiritually.

The Lord deals with us as a parent does with his children; he does
not smile upon us, does not give us a kiss, will not speak kindly
to us, or look upon us as in times past with looks of favour and
love, and will not, as it seems, hear us when we call. You teach
your child by similar means your displeasure. When you are
reserved, and keep him at a distance, he knows the reason, and
he feels the reserve as a mark of your displeasure. So it is with
God. When he denies answers to our prayers; shuts up his
manifested mercy; leaves us to wretched, desponding, and
gloomy feelings, these are all chastisements, and are to be
received as such; and when they are so received, they work good
effects in the soul, for they produce submission, resignation,
quietness, meekness, and humility.

In these, and other various ways, of which time will not suffice to
mention the tenth part, God chastens his people. The Lord
chastens those whom he loves; and "blessed is the man whom he
chastens." There are many afflicted, but only few chastened:
many have abundance of worldly trouble; but only God's people
are really chastened, so as to see and feel the hand of God in the
rod, and submit to it as such. Here is all the difference between a
believer and an unbeliever, between a child of God and an infidel.
2. We pass on to consider the second part of the blessedness of
the man whom God chastens. "And teachest him out of thy law."
We have just hinted at the reason why chastening precedes
teaching. We have no ear for instruction till we feel the stroke of
God upon us. It was so with the prodigal. Until he was brought to
his right mind by strokes of hunger, he did not think of his
father's house; he had no heart to return; but a mighty famine
sent him home. So it is with God's children; as long as they are
allowed to wander in their backslidings, they have no heart to
return. But let the rod come: let them be driven home with
stripes; then they have an ear to listen, while God teaches them
to profit, instructs them by his blessed Spirit, and speaks into
their heart those lessons which are for their eternal good. "And
teachest him out of thy law." We should, I think, much err from
the mind of the Spirit, if we confined the meaning of the word
"law," as some do, to the law strictly and properly so called.
"The law" in the Scriptures has a very wide signification; it
means, in the original, instruction. The word is Torah, which
signifies 'teaching' or 'direction.' And as the law given by Moses
was the grand instruction that God gave to the children of Israel
into his holiness and purity, the word Torah, or instruction,
became fixed in a definite manner to the law as given at Sinai.
But the word in itself has a far higher meaning, signifying
instruction generally; and thus we find, in the New Testament,
that the word "law" is not confined to the law of Moses given in
thunder and lightning upon Mount Sinai. For instance, we read of
"the law of the Spirit of life" in Christ Jesus, which hath "made me
free from the law of sin and death." Ro 8:2 The "law of the Spirit
of life" there mentioned does not mean the law given on Mount
Sinai. Again, "Whoso looketh into the perfect law of liberty, and
continueth therein, he being not a forgetful hearer, but a doer of
the work, this man shall be blessed in his deed" (James 1:25).
"The perfect law of liberty," does not, cannot mean the law given
at Mount Sinai; it is the gospel of Jesus Christ; the instruction,
the Torah, which the Spirit has given of the Lord Jesus, and
therefore called "the perfect law of liberty." So, in the Old
Testament, "O how I love thy law; it is my meditation all the day"
(Ps. 119:97). David was not meditating all the day upon the
words given upon Mount Sinai; he was not utterly consumed with
terrors by meditating upon the strictness and holiness of God as
revealed in that law; but he was looking into the gospel, and in
that law he delighted all the day, as beholding in it the glories of
the Lamb.

And thus, in our text, when it says, "Blessed is the man whom
thou chastenest, O Lord, and teachest him out of thy law:" it
does mean, I grant, in the first instance, the law strictly speaking
as revealing the purity, holiness, and perfection of God; but we
must not limit it, as some do, to the law definitely so called. A
man, then, is blessed whom God teaches out of his law: that is,
brings near those things which the law reveals, and seals them
upon his heart. The law is a manifestation of God's purity,
holiness, justice, majesty, greatness, and glory; and was given
upon Mount Sinai in thunderings, lightnings, and earthquakes, to
shew forth the majesty of God. Now the Lord, in the first
instance, teaches his people by shewing to them out of the law
his purity, holiness, majesty, the perfection of his character, his
indignation against sin, and his wrath against sinners. And every
feeling of guilt produced by a manifestation of God's purity,
affection, uprightness, justice, wrath, indignation against sin, and
direful vengeance that burns to the lowest hell—every such
conviction, and every such feeling is a teaching out of his law. But
there are some living souls whom God has taught, and is teaching
out of his law, who because some definite words of the law have
not been applied to their heart, are full of fear that they never
had the sentence of the law written in their conscience.

But there is one mark, if not more, whereby we may know

whether we have ever had the application of the law strictly
speaking to our conscience. What is this'? The law "gendereth to
bondage," that is, it generates or produces bondage in the soul.
Now there may be some here this evening, who may say, 'I do
not know that I ever had definite words applied to my
conscience—such as, "Cursed is every one who continueth not in
all things which are written in the book of the law to do them."
'But let us see whether by bringing your experience to the word
of God, you cannot find that you have experienced what
sometimes you fear you have not. Have you never felt bondage?
Has your soul never been shut up, and unable to come forth?
Have you had no slavish fear of God? Have you never been as it
were bound in fetters of iron, and felt that nothing but the mighty
power of God coming into your soul could set you free? Have you
had no slavish fears of death? We read, that there were some
who "all their life-time" were subject to this fear. Have you had
no fear of death when the cholera is going about? Have you had
no dread lest that awful scourge might enter your door, and you
might be stricken with the fearful malady? Has no groan or sigh
gone up to God through the dread of it? What is this but
bondage? And what gendereth bondage but the law? Not the
letter, but the spirit of the law: because it genders, that is,
generates, as a father, in the soul, what the dead lifeless letter
cannot possibly do, a spirit of bondage. If you have felt this
bondage, this fear, these doubts, these manacles and chains,
which your sins have wreathed round your neck, then you have
been taught "out of the law;" aye, you have felt the law; for it
has produced a spirit of bondage in your soul. Let us see whether
we cannot find another mark. It is this; "By the law is the
knowledge of sin." Have you any knowledge of sin? Have the sins
of your evil heart ever been felt? 'Have you ever seen the purity
and perfection of Jehovah; and felt the justice of God in his holy
law'? Do you ever feel that had God sentenced your soul to
eternal damnation, he would be just; that you had deserved it all,
and brought it on your own head'? Can you say, that he would be
just in condemning you to the lowest hell'? If you have felt this,
you have been taught out of God's law; for "by the law is the
knowledge of sin." But we pass on to consider "the law," in a
different point of view. The "law," as I have already noticed,
signifies not merely "the law," strictly speaking as the sentence of
condemnation; but it includes also the gospel of the Lord Jesus
Christ—"the perfect law of liberty; the law of the spirit of life in
Christ Jesus;" that law which was in the heart of the Redeemer,
when he said, "I come to do thy will, O God; yea, thy law is
within my heart."
Now, as the Lord teaches his children "out of the law," strictly so
called, so he teaches them "out of" the gospel; and to my mind
there is something exceedingly sweet and expressive in the words
"out of the law." It seems to convey to my mind, not only that
the law is a treasure-house of wrath, but that the gospel also is a
treasure-house of mercy. And as those who know most of the law
are only taught "out of the law," and not the whole of the law,
only a few drops as it were, out of the inexhaustible wrath of
God; so out of the heavenly treasure-house of the gospel, "the
perfect law of liberty," 'it is but a little of grace and mercy that in
this life can be known. As Christ said to his disciples in promising
the Spirit; "He shall take of mine, and shall shew it unto you"
(John 16:15). He cannot take "all," and shew it unto them; for
none could live under the sight. The Spirit, therefore, takes of the
things of Christ, and shews here a little and there a little; some
little blessedness here, and some little blessedness there; a
suitable promise, a gracious testimony, a comforting text, an
encouraging word, a sight of atoning blood, a smile of his
countenance, a view of his Person, a discovery of his
righteousness, or a glimpse of his love. This is taking of the
things of Christ and revealing them to the soul. And thus, the
man whom the Lord takes in hand, he teaches "out of" the gospel
by making Christ experimentally known, and revealing his dying
love. And thus he teaches each and all "out of his law"—both the
law from Sinai, and the law from Zion.

But, observe the connection between chastening and teaching.

This is what I am wishing to impress upon you. Suppose you are
in a carnal state of mind; say you are a man of business, have
done a good stroke today, have got something which has
wonderfully pleased your covetous heart, have been carried away
by some worldly project. But you have come to chapel this
evening. Are you in a fit state to hear the word of God? Is the
Lord about to teach you now out of the gospel? You are not the
man, nor is your soul in a fit state to receive it. But suppose it
otherwise. Say, the Lord has been sorely chastening you of late;
you are just recovering from a painful sickness; have lost a child;
had an affliction in your family; something trying has happened
today, yesterday, or the last week in your worldly circumstances;
or the Lord has set to his hand, and wrought more powerfully
upon your soul than he has for months past; you have been cut
up with convictions, felt your backslidings, and could scarcely
bear to creep to chapel, lest you should hear your own
condemnation.

You are the very person whom God is chastening that he may
teach out of his law. You were not in a fit state before to hear;
you were thinking how tedious the minister was, and wondering
when he would finish the sermon; your mind was full of
wandering thoughts, or you were cavilling at all you heard. But
now you have an ear to hear; a sigh and a cry in your heart and
lips when you come to chapel; and in groaning out your petition
before you come, you say, 'O Lord, wilt thou speak one word to
my soul tonight? Wilt thou kindly look upon a poor vile
backslider? O do manifest thyself to me!' This is teaching
following chastening. You must have chastening first; you must
first be brought to your senses, have a heart given you to feel;
have many stripes laid upon you to bring your wandering feet
back to the paths of righteousness; and then the gospel is for
you.

The promises of mercy, the sweet invitations, the forgivenesses

with God, and all the blessings which the gospel is filled with, are
for those whom the Lord brings down and chastens. And
therefore, there are very few persons who are really in a state fit
to hear the gospel, the precious love of God as revealed in the
Person of Christ. This is the reason why we have so many
hardened antinomians in our day; so many dry, doctrinal
professors, whose lives, conduct, and conversation are
disgraceful to the name they profess. It is because they are not
chastened. And this makes them the bitterest enemies to real
experimental truth, and to the men who speak out of the fulness
of a believing, exercised heart. There is a connection, therefore,
betwixt being chastened, afflicted, exercised, and being taught
"out of the law." God does not teach, and afterwards chasten for
disobedience: but he first brings down the heart with labour, and
then sows in it the seeds of instruction.

II.—But we pass on to our second branch, which is, the reason

why the Lord chastens and teaches his children,—"that he may
give them rest from days of adversity." There are "days of
adversity" coming; and these may be more serious than any one
at present expects. We may have days of great adversity and
troublous times as regards the country generally. We may have
persecutions. We may have calamitous times as regards
business, trade, and worldly circumstances; and these things
affect all men. We are so linked together, so dependent upon
each other, that what touches one touches all. If troublous times
come, they will touch the church as well as the world. What a
blessing, then, for God's people, if they have a rest from the
"days of adversity;" if they have a God to go to, a Jesus to lean
on, a lap to be dandled in, and a bosom to pillow their aching
heads.

But, supposing the political horizon is not overshadowed;

supposing worldly matters are peaceable and quiet, there may be
"days of adversity" of another character. You may have a long
and painful sickness, be brought into very trying circumstances;
you that are now in comparative comfort may be brought down to
poverty; you may have a very heavy affliction in your family; and
see little else but "days of adversity." These will come, and we
cannot prevent them. We can no more say "the day of adversity"
shall not come, than we can say, tomorrow will not be a rainy
day, or that the shadow will not attend tomorrow's sunshine. The
Lord, then, knowing the "days of adversity" which are in store;
knowing that sickness and death are coming, has prepared a rest
beforehand; "Come, my people," he says, "enter thou into thy
chambers, and shut thy doors about thee; hide thyself for a little
moment until the indignation be overpast."

But how do we get this "rest?" By being chastened and by being

taught. Till we are chastened, we make the world our home; and
a very pleasant paradise it is. Our children, our connections, our
pursuits, our worldly ease, the many airy castles that we build
up, are all very pleasant to us until strokes of chastisement come,
and the Lord begins to afflict us in body, in family, or in soul. Yet
how kind it is and all the kinder for being painful for the Lord
to chasten us home. Our child may perhaps be from home; there
is a storm gathering; the thunder is ready to break forth; and he
is about to be exposed to the lightning's flash. If he loiter, are
you dealing unkindly with him if you whip him home? Is not every
stroke a kindness that brings him out of the thunderstorm? It is
so spiritually. The Lord sees that there is a thunderstorm
gathering; the lightnings are about to flash; the rain to pour; the
hail to strike. Is not every stroke a kind stroke, a stroke of love
that brings the wanderer home to find shelter under God's wing
until this storm be overpast? We might be wandering abroad in
the world with our heads exposed to the lightning stroke; we
might hear the warning peal, and be yet too far from home to get
there in time; but the Lord foreseeing "the days of adversity,"
comes with strokes and drives us home. He will not let us lie
down in the green fields and flowery meadows, and sleep under
the trees.

His strokes are strokes dipped in love; and, however cutting to

the flesh, if blessed by the Spirit, they are made instrumental in
driving us home, bringing us to our right mind, and shewing us
where true rest is only to be found—in Christ, in his Person, love,
blood, grace, and suitability; in all that he is and all that he has.
What a wise and kind parent, then, he is to chasten us, though
painful at the time, and to teach us out of his law and gospel,
that he may give us rest from "the days of adversity."

III.—But we come to our third point; what the Lord is preparing

in the meanwhile for the ungodly. There is no chastening for
them; no teaching for them; no preparing a rest for them; or
preparing them for rest. What, then, is doing for them? What a
striking figure here the Lord makes use of! "Until the pit be
digged for the wicked." What is the figure? Is it not this? In
Eastern countries, the ordinary mode of catching wild beasts is to
dig a pit, and fix sharp spears in the bottom: and when the pit
has been dug sufficiently deep, it is covered over with branches
of trees, earth, and leaves, until all appearances of the pitfall are
entirely concealed. What is the object? That the wild beast intent
upon bloodshed—the tiger lying in wait for the deer, the wolf
roaming after the sheep, the lion prowling for the antelope, or the
elephant breaking through the jungle, not seeing the pitfall, but
rushing on and over it, may not see their doom until they break
through and fall upon the spears at the bottom.

What a striking figure is this! Here are the ungodly, all intent
upon their purposes; prowling after evil, as the wolf after the
sheep, or the tiger after the deer, thinking only of some worldly
profit, some covetous plan, some lustful scheme, something the
carnal mind delights in; but on they go, not seeing any danger
until the moment comes when, as Job says, "they go down to the
bars of the pit." The Lord has been pleased to hide their doom
from them; the pit is all covered over with leaves of trees, grass,
and earth. The very appearance of the pit was hidden from the
wild beasts; they never knew it until they fell into it, and were
transfixed. So it is with the wicked; both with the professors and
the profane. There is no fear of God, no taking heed to their
steps, no cry to be directed, no prayer to be shewn the way; no
pausing, no turning back;—on they go, on they go; heedlessly,
thoughtlessly, recklessly; pursuing some beloved object,—on they
go, on they go; till in a moment they are plunged eternally and
irrevocably into the pit.

There are many such both in the professing church as well as in

the ungodly world. The Lord sees what they are, and where they
are; he knows where the pit is; in what part of the wood; how
situated in the jungle. God knows their steps; he sees them
hurrying on, hurrying on, hurrying on. All is prepared for them.
The Lord gives them no forewarning, no notice of their danger;
no teachings, no chastenings, remonstrances, no frowns, no
stripes; they are left to themselves to fill up the measure of their
iniquity, until they approach the pit that has been dug for them,
and then down they sink to the bottom. This will never be the
case with the righteous. They are forewarned; they take heed to
their ways; the Lord chastens them betimes; he teaches them out
of his law; he gives them right and deep views of his purity and
holiness; and shews them also the refuge which he has prepared
for them in the love and blood of the Lamb. Thus, in "the days of
adversity," they have a solemn resting-place in the bosom of
God, in his covenant faithfulness and love.

Now do you lay these things to heart'? How have you come to
chapel this evening? What has God done for your soul? Has
curiosity or some other motive brought you here? Or do you
come hoping to hear that which will do you good, and be
spiritually and lastingly profitable? Have you found anything
spoken this evening suitable to your case and state? Can you
find, looking back on the dealings of God with you in providence
or grace, that he has been chastening you? Do fix your eyes, you
that desire to fear God, on this mark; say to yourselves, 'Lord,
have I been chastened of thee? Can I see in my various afflictions
the hand of God? Have they done my soul good? Have they been
a voice speaking to my heart? Have they brought forth in me the
fruits of holiness? Can I say, Lord, "Blessed is the man whom
thou chastenest;" and I am that man?' If so, you are not the
wicked. God is not digging a pit for you; he is chastening you
betimes that he may "give you rest from the days of adversity;"
you have a God to go to, and a blessed bosom to lean upon when
"the days of adversity" come, and the wicked fall headlong into
the pit.
The Blessedness of the Man whom the Lord hath Chosen

Preached at Zoar Chapel, Great Alie Street, London, on Lord's

Day Morning, Dec. 13, 1857

"Blessed is the man whom thou choosest, and causest to

approach unto thee, that he may dwell in thy courts; we shall be
satisfied with the goodness of thy house, even of thine holy
temple." Psalm 65:4

There are many professors of religion who have the greatest

horror possible of the doctrine of election. Awful indeed is the
length to which the enmity of the carnal mind has carried some in
their blasphemous speeches against this scriptural truth. There
are those who have said, that if God has arbitrarily chosen some
to salvation, and rejected others, he is no better than a tyrant or
Moloch; and others have declared, that they would sooner be
with Satan in hell than dwell with such a God in heaven. But I will
not pollute my lips with the awful blasphemies that ungodly men,
both professing and profane, have vented against this branch of
divine sovereignty. In spite of all their indignation and enmity, it
still stands as an immutable truth, that "the election hath
obtained it, and the rest are blinded;" (Rom. 11:7,) and that "it is
not of him that willeth, nor of him that runneth, but of God that
sheweth mercy." (9:16.)

Now, these very same persons who think it most unreasonable

that God should exercise his election, think it very reasonable
that they should exercise theirs. For instance; they think it highly
reasonable that they should choose their own partners in life; yet
they think it very unreasonable that Christ should choose his own
Bride. What would they think if they were denied this right of
election? or if they were compelled to take in marriage any
woman that chose to thrust herself upon them? And is it not
equally unreasonable, in a divine sense, that Christ should be
forced to take into union and communion with himself every
proud pharisee or presumptuous professor that chooses to make
a claim upon him?
Again; they think it highly reasonable that they should have the
right of choosing their own abode, and selecting the house where
they should dwell; yet they think it highly unreasonable that God
should choose the persons whom he may make his temple, and in
whom he may take up his abode for ever.

So also; they would think it highly unreasonable, if they were not

allowed to choose that business or profession in life, which should
most display their abilities, and open up the greatest avenue for
profit or praise; yet they think it highly unreasonable that God
should choose a people in whom he will be glorified.

"But," they might say, "the parallel does not hold good; there is
no analogy in the case. Your are speaking of the things of time, in
which choice may be allowed; but election regards eternity,
where we certainly cannot allow it at all." But we do [perhaps
this should be, do we?] not find that, just in proportion to the
length of time, they claim to themselves the right of choice? For
instance; a person might put up with a very inconvenient
apartment for a night, but he would not think of choosing such a
place as a habitation for life; or you might stay with a person for
an hour, whose company you would not like for a month. So that
just in proportion to the length of time, we claim to have a right
of choice. May we not carry this into divine things? Is not God
perfectly at liberty to choose the persons who shall dwell with him
for ever in glory? And has he not, as a Sovereign, a clear right to
select whom he will to be partakers of his happiness? Men may
rebel at these doctrines, and kick at these mountains of brass;
but "Woe unto him that striveth with his Maker!" Sooner or later,
all such contentions will end in the destruction of the contenders.
It is our wisdom and mercy not to cavil, but to submit. And if God
has given to us any testimony of our election in Christ, they will
answer a hundred cavils better than any arguments, and satisfy
our souls more than a thousand reasons.

We find, in the text, a blessing pronounced upon the man whom

God hath chosen, "Blessed is the man whom thou choosest." We
do not find David venting his gall and enmity against election; but
rather pouring out his heart in thanksgiving that God had a
people in whom he would be glorified, and especially pronouncing
a blessing upon the happy individual on whom that eternal choice
is fixed.

With God's blessing, we will take up the text in the same order as
the Holy Ghost has revealed it; and consider its different
branches and various clauses, as it lies before us in the word of
truth.

I.—It begins, "Blessed is the man whom thou choosest." Why

should this man be blessed? Because election is the root of all
blessings, the source and fountain of every spiritual mercy that
the soul receives. This is the ever-flowing and overflowing
fountain, from which all the streams of mercy and grace come
into the heart, and in which the redeemed will bathe throughout
the never-ending ages of eternity.

But let us look a little closer into the nature of this choice.

1. We observe at once, that it is a personal and individual choice

that the Holy Ghost here speaks of, "Blessed is the man whom
thou choosest." This makes election such a personal matter, that
it is fixed, not upon nations and countries, and such loose
generalities, but upon individuals. And in this way God always
seals it upon the conscience, by bringing it home with power to
the heart of each individual object of his favour.

2. It is also a choice in Christ; as we read, "According as he hath

chosen us in him" (that is, Christ), "before the foundation of the
world." (Eph. 1:4.) The election of the people of God is in the Son
of his love. He is their covenant Head, in whom they have their
eternal standing. They are chosen not for any works, goodness,
or worthiness in them; but they are elected in Christ, "to the
praise of the glory of his grace, wherein he has made us accepted
in the Beloved."
3. But this choice is unto eternal life; as we read (Acts 13:48),
"As many as were ordained to eternal life believed." And how
much is summed up in this expression, "eternal life!" that when
time shall be no more, when the wicked shall be turned into hell,
and this changeable scene shall have closed, then the happiness
of the redeemed shall be but commencing, a happiness that will
know no termination, but continue through never-ending ages.

4. But in choosing his people, the Lord has made ample provision
by the way, that they shall not, as men say, "live as they list;"
that they shall not abuse this doctrine unto licentiousness, or give
free scope to their base lusts and passions. We, therefore, read,
that they are "elect unto obedience and sprinkling of the blood of
Jesus Christ" (1 Pet. 1:2); and that they are "God's workmanship,
created in Christ Jesus unto good works, which God hath before
ordained that we should walk in them." (Eph. 2:10.) So that
when this precious truth of election is sealed upon the
conscience, so far from relaxing the obligations to holiness, it
binds a man more closely to obedience, and causes him to bring
forth those fruits of righteousness which are to the praise and
glory of God. Where the doctrine of election does not do this for a
man, it does nothing for him. If it do not constrain him by every
sweet and holy tie to yield his body, soul, and spirit, to the
service of God; if it bring him not out of the world, and separate
him as a vessel of honour made meet for the Master's use; if it do
not bind him with cords of love, to the throne of God, it is but a
doctrine floating in the head, but a speculation in the natural
understanding. It is not a truth sealed upon the heart, and
received into the conscience under the teachings of God the
Spirit.

II.—But we pass on to consider what flows out of this eternal

choice of God. "Blessed is the man whom thou choosest, and
causest to approach unto thee." The original choice is the root;
the approach unto God is the fruit. The one precedes and is the
cause of the other; for every one whom God chooses he causes
to approach unto him.
Now, what and where are we by nature? We should never forget
our base original. The Lord tells us to "look unto the rock whence
we are hewn, and to the hole of the pit whence we are digged."
(Isa. 51:1.) We must never forget our fallen condition; as the
Lord bade his people confess, "A Syrian ready to perish was my
father." (Deut. 26:5.) Thus he bids us consider our fallen state by
nature, that by looking into that horrible pit and miry clay, we
may see how the hand of the Lord has mercifully brought us out.

What and where are we, then, by nature. At a distance from God,
alienated from him, carnal, callous, reckless, dead in sin, without
one spiritual feeling or heavenly desire, without one holy
breathing or panting to know God, and to have his mercy
revealed to our conscience. An impenetrable barrier closing up all
spiritual access, exists between God and our soul. The Lord in
choosing his people, has not chosen them to die as they were
born; he has not elected them to live in ignorance, enmity, and
sin, and then, when death comes, to take them to heaven without
a change. That is not God's election. But God having "chosen
them that they should be holy and without blame before him in
love," brings them to the spiritual knowledge of himself, that they
may thus be made new creatures, and made meet by a divine
work upon their consciences for the inheritance of the saints in
light. He therefore breaks down the barriers between himself and
their souls. But he makes us feel there is a barrier before he
breaks it down. What are these barriers?

1. The first barrier that stands between a just God and a guilty
soul, is the holy law. Did you ever notice the place where the
altar is first spoken of under the law, and the spot which it also
occupied in the tabernacle? Where do we find an altar of burnt-
offering first commanded? In Exod. 20:24, the very chapter
where the law was given. No sooner had God revealed the law
with thunderings and lightnings from Mount Sinai, than he speaks
of the altar which they were to build for him; typically showing,
that no sooner is the sinner condemned by the law, than there is
the altar of Christ's atoning blood to flee to. Did you ever also
notice the situation which the brazen altar occupied in the
tabernacle? It was not in the "holy of holies," where none but the
High Priest entered once a year; nor "in the holy place," to which
the Priests alone had access; but it was in the court, in the
entrance before the holy place, in order that all Israel might see
it. "And he put the altar of burnt-offering, by the door of the
tabernacle of the tent of the congregation." (Ex. 40:29.) The altar
of burnt-offering, with its ever burning fire, was typical of the
offering of the Lord Jesus, and it was so placed, that its smoke
and flame was the first sight that presented itself to the eye of
the worshipper. Thus, when we first see and feel the guilt of sin
under a broken law, we cannot advance till there is a sight of the
altar. "We have an altar," says the Apostle. (Heb. 13:10.) But
when this altar (that is, the sacrifice and propitiation for sin which
Jesus made), is made known in the soul, it breaks down the
partition wall, and enables the soul to draw near unto God.

2. But besides this barrier of guilt from a broken law, there is also
another, which arises from the soul being penetrated with shame.
When God the Spirit touches the conscience with his finger, and
charges the sin home upon it, it not merely produces a feeling of
guilt, but also confusion of face. Our first parents, till they had
broken God's command knew no shame; nor do we till we know
we are sinners in his sight. Now we cannot draw near with
confidence unto the Lord, so long as we feel shame before him.
He has, then, provided means to remove this sense of inward
shame; he has appointed "the blood of sprinkling" to purge the
conscience from filth, and dead works, to serve the living God.
Through the one propitiation, spiritually made known, the
conscience becomes cleansed, and the soul finds access to God
through the blood of the Lamb; therefore we read, "For your
shame ye shall have double." (Isa. 61:7); and again, "Fear not,
for thou shalt not be ashamed; neither be thou confounded, for
thou shalt not be put to shame; for thou shalt forget the shame
of thy youth, and shalt not remember the reproach of thy
widowhood any more." (Isa. 54:4.)

3. But we want something more than this. The soul convinced of

sin, and deeply penetrated with shame and confusion of face,
needs something more than the sight of that atoning blood that
cleanseth from all sin. It wants with it the secret drawings of the
Spirit, as the Bride says, "Draw me, we will run after thee." (Sol.
Song 1:4); and as the Lord speaks to the church, "I have loved
thee with an everlasting love; therefore with lovingkindness have
I drawn thee." (Jer. 31:3.) We find this sweetly set forth in the
Canticles, "My beloved put in his hand by the hole in the door,
and my bowels were moved for him." (5:4.) The Lord is here
represented as putting forth his hand into the soul, and thus
secretly drawing up the heart and affections for himself.

Under these inward drawings and secret movements of the Spirit

upon the heart, the Lord causes us to approach unto him. We
cannot approach him in faith and affection until he draws us with
the cords of love, and the bands of a man; but when he puts
forth his hand and touches the heart, he secretly yet irresistibly
draws the soul near to himself.

4. But we must feel something more still to be caused to

approach, for we are very backward to draw near to God. Guilt,
sin, and shame darken the mind, harden the heart, and
numerous things, springing from the world and the flesh
together, keep us back from the Lord. So that to cause us to
approach unto him, he gives some glimpses of his reconciled
countenance, some intimations of his favour, some droppings-in
of a gracious promise just suited to our state, or some heart
melting testimony that meets every want. Under these the heart
becomes broken, softened, and humbled, and is enabled to
approach unto the Lord.

But how do we approach him? If we approach him aright, it is

with confession. We cannot, if God has touched our conscience
with his finger, rush recklessly and heedlessly into his presence;
for there will be in the heart, under divine teachings, a reverence
of his great name, a godly fear, a prostration of spirit before him,
with confession and acknowledgment of sin. But this is humbling
work. We find it so naturally. If we have done that which is
wrong, how hard and humbling it is to make acknowledgment!
How it goes against the pride of our heart! What a humbling place
it is to take, to have to confess we have acted wrongly or
foolishly! So spiritually, it is a very humbling place to take, to
come with confession, and acknowledge and bewail our manifold
backslidings, our heart idolatries, the base and aggravated sins
that our consciences at times feel and groan under. Yet after all it
is sweet to confess. Humility is far sweeter than pride; confession
is far sweeter than self-justification. It is so naturally. When the
wife has offended the husband, or when the husband has
offended the wife; when the child has offended the parent, or the
servant the master; whatever secret gratification there may be in
self-justification and obstinate stubbornness, it is really much
sweeter to confess. Much more so spiritually. When we can
confess our sins, when the tears roll down our cheeks, when the
bosom heaves with sobs of genuine contrition, there is a pleasure
and sweetness in this honest confession far greater than in the
devilish gratification of standing out proudly and presumptuously
against God and conscience. But the Lord himself must touch the
heart; and when he touches it, confession will flow out. Like the
rock that Moses struck, our hearts naturally are hard and
impenetrable; but no sooner was it smitten by the wonder-
working rod than the waters gushed out. So no sooner are our
hearts struck by the word of God than brokenness, contrition, and
confession flow forth. With these, there will be prayer also and
supplication; as we read, "They shall come with weeping, and
with supplications will I lead them." (Jer. 31:9.) This is the way in
which the soul approaches the Lord; not with hardened
presumption, but with supplication, earnest breathings, filial
pantings, and desires after the manifestations of himself; so that
the soul pours itself, so to speak, into the bosom of God.
5. But we cannot approach unto the Lord without some measure
of divine faith, as the Apostle says, "He that cometh to God must
believe that he is." (Heb. 11:6.) So that when the Lord would
cause us to approach unto him, he kindles and draws out into
exercise a measure of faith in our hearts; and by this faith we
take hold of God's strength, as we read, "Let him take hold of my
strength that he may make peace with me." (Isa. 27:5.) By faith
we embrace the promises; by faith we eye the Saviour at God's
right hand, on his throne of grace and glory; by faith we view the
blood of sprinkling; by faith we look into the compassionate and
sympathizing bosom of Jesus; by faith we believe the truth as it
is revealed in him; and by faith these things are laid hold of,
brought in, embraced, and in a measure enjoyed in the heart.
What a mercy it is to be enabled thus to approach unto God in
Christ! He is the source of light and life; every blessing for time
and eternity comes from him; and by approaching unto him, we
get a measure of these blessings. If we are in darkness, when the
Lord causes the soul to approach unto him, light comes and
dispels it. If we are in heaviness, and the Lord causes us to
approach unto him, he disperses it; for though "Weeping may
endure for a night, yet joy cometh in the morning." (Psa. 30:8.)
If trials—family, bodily, or providential—if heavy weights and
burdens press down, when the Lord causes us to approach unto
him, and we get near that eternal and inexhaustible Source of
bliss and blessedness, these afflictions become lightened, at least
for a time are removed off the shoulders, crooked things become
straight; and rough places are made plain. Have you not found it
so? And if you know what it is to approach unto the Lord,
however hard you may feel, whatever darkness covers the mind,
whatever iciness may seem to freeze up every breathing of our
soul, yet when the Lord gives us power to come near unto him
(for we have no power to do it ourselves) a measure of relief and
ease generally follow. Now, if I am parching for thirst, where
must I go to alleviate it? Must I not go to the Fountain of living
waters? If I am cold, shall I revive myself by dipping my hand
into ice? I must go near the source of warmth and heat; I must
get near the sun. And so spiritually, if I am cold, torpid, frozen,
so as to have no spiritual feeling in exercise, how am I to get
warmth to revive my icy and benumbed soul? By approaching the
Sun of Righteousness. If I am hungry naturally, how is that
hunger to be removed? Not by talking or thinking about food, but
by partaking of the bread put into my hand. So if I hunger
spiritually, my hunger can only be satisfied by feeding upon the
bread of life. What a libel then upon the doctrine of election it is,
to say, "Because a man is elected he may live as he pleases; that
he may be a quickened vessel of mercy, and yet be a vile
monster of iniquity." O what a libel! The Psalmist says, "Blessed
is the man whom thou choosest, and causest to approach unto
thee." If, then, the Lord chooses a man, he causes that man to
approach unto him. Now is it not a libel upon the character of
God, to say, that a man can approach unto a holy God, and yet
live in unholiness; that he can draw near to an all-pure and
blessed Jehovah, and yet wallow in sin and filth; that he can be
brought nigh to a God hating and abhorring sin with perfect
hatred, and yet indulge in every vile gratification. Why if I
approach unto God I must get some resemblance unto him. It is
so in all cases. "He that walketh with wise men shall be wise; but
the companion of fools shall be destroyed." (Prov. 13:20.) Does
not worldly intercourse make us worldly; and does not spiritual
intercourse tend to make us spiritual? As we draw near to
gracious, well-taught people, do we not often find some measure
of spirituality communicated through them to our hearts? And can
we draw near unto the Fountain of light and life, as a holy sin-
hating God, and then say, "we may live in sin and do the things
which that holy God abhors?" I will tell you when it is we can do
things which God hates. It is when we live at a distance from
him, when there is no approach unto that Fountain of light and
life, when the world has a firm possession of us, when we are
unable to draw near through darkness of mind, and the soul is
gone out after its idols. It is not by approaching near unto the
Lord that we commit sin; that purifies, cleanses, and spiritualizes
the heart, that destroys the power of sin; and the more we
approach unto him, the more power and grace we receive out of
him to mortify sin, and crucify the flesh with the affections and
lusts.

III.—Our next point is to consider, why the Lord causes the man
of his choice to approach unto him; "that he may dwell in thy
courts." What are these courts? The courts of the temple. The
temple was a figure of Jesus, which shadowed forth his holy
human nature. And as God dwelt visibly in the temple, by the
Shekinah on the mercy-seat, so does the Godhead dwell in the
Lord Jesus Christ; "for in him dwelleth all the fulness of the
Godhead bodily." (Col. 2:9.) That, then, is the reason why the
temple is so much spoken of in God's word, and why so many
blessings are connected with it. And thus in the text, when it is
said, "that he may dwell in thy courts," it is not meant merely the
courts of the earthly temple, but to dwell in those courts which
the earthly temple shadowed forth. This is why we are caused to
approach unto God. It is to dwell near unto Jesus; it is to have a
sense of mercy, pardon, and peace received into the conscience
out of his glorious fulness.

But let us look a little at the word dwell—"that he may dwell in

thy courts." It signifies a fixed habitation; so that the man whom
God chooses, and causes to approach unto himself, has a fixed
abode in the courts of the Lord's house. This implies, that he is
brought out of the world, no more to go back; that he is cut off
from a dead form of religion, to be wrapped up in it no more; that
he is brought out of every thing earthly, sensual, and devilish, so
as to be transformed by the renewing of his mind; that he is
brought into a spiritual, holy, and experimental relationship with
God, and knows something of living under the shadow of the
Almighty. The courts were connected with the temple, were a
part of the temple, and the sanctity of the temple were
communicated to them. These courts were built after a divine
pattern, as we read, "Then David gave to Solomon his son the
pattern of the porch, and the pattern of all that he had by the
Spirit, of the courts of the house of the Lord." (1 Chr. 27:11, 12.)
None but the priests could enter into the temple, and none but
the High Priest could enter into the most holy place; but the
courts of the temple, which were part of the temple, were open to
all the children of Israel. There is a sweet figure in this, that
those who dwelt in the courts of the temple were sanctified so to
speak, by the temple. It was in the court of the temple that the
sacrifices were offered; in the holy place that the altar of incense
and the table of shew-bread stood; and in the most holy place
the ark of the covenant, with the mercy-seat, on which the
Shekinah, or divine glory rested; whence God is said to "dwell
between the cherubims;" (Psa. 81:1) and there too the Spirit of
prophecy resided. The holy human nature of Jesus, and his
mediatorial work, grace, and glory, were all shadowed forth by
the temple, (it being built after the pattern of the tabernacle in
the wilderness;) and this was the reason why the believing
Israelites of old so loved and looked to it. Thus Jonah, in the very
belly of hell, said, "I will look unto thy holy temple" (Jonah 2:4),
and Daniel, when in captivity in Babylon, though death was the
penalty, opened his window three times a day towards Jerusalem,
his eyes looking towards the place where the temple stood,
though then in ruins. In the temple then every thing dwelt to
meet the wants and necessities of spiritual worshippers. It is so in
him whom the temple feebly shadowed forth. I am guilty, filthy,
defiled; where shall I go, but to the temple? for there is the
brazen laver, typifying the fountain open for sin and uncleanness.
I am a poor guilty criminal in myself; I need mercy; where must I
go for it, but to the mercy-seat sprinkled with atoning blood; I
am often in great darkness of mind; I need light; where must I
go for it but to the Shekinah, where the light shines, the light of
the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ? I have continually
enigmas to unravel, dark mysteries to be solved; where shall I go
but to the temple, that the all-wise Prophet may untie those
intricate knots, clear up these dark experiences, unwind the
mysterious providence, and bring relief under my various
exercises? In the temple too all the love of God is concentrated,
for it is in Christ alone that the love of God is displayed. "Herein
is love; not that we loved God, but that he loved us, and sent his
Son to be the propitiation for our sins." (1 John 4:10.) In the
temple of Christ's human nature the love of God is manifested.
There is no love out of that temple. No; nothing but wrath, and
indignation, and consuming fire; nothing but righteous vengeance
of God against sin and unholiness out of the Person, blood and
righteousness of God's dear Son. Do I want love, then, in my
heart? It is to be enjoyed in the courts of the temple where alone
this love is manifested. Do I want reconciliation, pardon, peace,
and every gospel blessing? It is in the temple, in the courts of the
temple, where God's honour dwelleth, that all these blessings are
bestowed upon spiritual worshippers.

Thus it was that David could bless the man so highly favoured.
He saw how favoured he was whom God had chosen to inherit
these mercies; he felt what a blessing arose from this eternal
choice, in God causing the poor sinner to approach near the
footstool of his mercy; he knew too what a blessing there was
wrapped up in the act of coming to the courts of God's temple,
and dwelling therein as a spiritual worshipper; and under these
feelings he cried, in another place, "A day in thy courts is better
than a thousand. I had rather be a doorkeeper in the house of my
God, than to dwell in the tents of wickedness." (Psalm 84:10.)
And so says every spiritual worshipper, who has seen the glory of
God in the temple; who has tasted peace, pardon, mercy, love,
blood and salvation through a crucified Jesus, and felt glory
dropping into his conscience under the unction of the Holy Ghost.
He would rather have the meanest place in the Lord's house, and
say, "A day in these courts, the courts of the Lord's house, is
better than a thousand spent in vanity and sin;" he would rather
occupy the meanest position in the church of God, so as to live
under the anointings of the Holy Ghost in his soul, than fill the
most distinguished station in the world.

IV.—And this leads David on to speak in behalf of himself and of

the spiritual Israel. He says, "We shall be satisfied with the
goodness of thy house, even of thy holy temple." Have we not
tried the world? For how many years did we labour to glut our
fleshly appetites with the dust and dirt that the world offered us;
but did we ever reap any solid satisfaction from it? Have we not
endeavoured to satisfy ourselves with the pleasures, so called, of
sin? and did they ever leave anything but pain and sorrow behind
them? Have we not attempted to satisfy ourselves with works,
with a form of godliness, a name to live, a self-righteous religion?
but was there not always something wanting? Have we not tried
to satisfy ourselves with doctrines floating in the judgment, and
yet reaped no satisfaction; for there was always an aching void?
Guilt was not purged away, sin was not pardoned, Christ not
revealed, the love of God not shed abroad, salvation not known;
so that there was no satisfaction in anything; all was a blank,
(and all is a blank except that,) all is vanity and vexation of spirit,
except the goodness of God's house to our souls. But when the
Lord has fixed his choice upon a vessel of mercy, and when, in
pursuance of that choice, cutting him off from the world, he
causes him, by the internal teachings and drawing of his Spirit, to
approach unto himself, brings him to dwell in the courts of his
temple, and shews him something of the beauty and glory of God
in the face of Jesus Christ—that satisfies him, and there is no
satisfaction until that is made known. And what are we to be
satisfied with? With a mere apprehension of Gospel truth? There
is no satisfaction there. With our experience? Why, if we look at
it, there are so many flaws and failings, so many ins and outs, so
many things that stagger us, that we cannot be fully satisfied
with all of that. Can we take the opinions of men concerning us?
O, we think, they may all be deceived. Can we take our own
opinion of ourselves? That is worse than the opinion of others; for
"he that trusteth his own heart is a fool."

With what, then, are we to be satisfied? "The goodness in God's

house," that is, the goodness manifested in the Person of Christ.
It is strange how spiritual persons should take such expressions
as "the house of God," and apply them to a building like this in
which we are assembled. You commonly hear it said in prayer,
"coming up to the house of God." But what warrant is there in
Scripture to call any church or chapel a house of God? I know the
temple was the house of God, because God dwelt there; but "God
does not now dwell in temples made with hands." The houses of
God in the New Testament has but two significations—the Person
of Christ, for "in him dwelleth all the fulness of the Godhead
bodily:" and the other, God's saints. "But Christ as a Son over his
own house; whose house are we, if we hold fast the confidence
and the rejoicing of the hope firm unto the end." (Heb. 4:6.)
"Having a high Priest over the house of God." (10:21) But no
mere collection of bricks and mortar, consecrated or
unconsecrated, adorned with a steeple, or without that
appendage, is worthy of the name of "the house of God." Christ is
the house of God, for in him the Godhead dwells; and the saints
are the house of God; for God dwells in them and walks in them.
(2 Cor. 6:16.) If then, any elect vessel of mercy is to be "satisfied
with the goodness of God's house," it does not mean that he is to
be satisfied with the goodness of a chapel. All of some people's
religion consists in the chapel where they attend; they have a
beautiful chapel, nicely fitted up, with a flourishing cause, a
respectable congregation, and a talented minister. All their
religion is in their chapel; and if you take that away, you take
away all their religion. But a chapel, however well fitted up,
however comfortable and convenient, will never satisfy the Lord's
people without the presence and power of God being felt and
made known, and the inward dew and savour of the Spirit resting
upon the minister and the heart of the hearers. I have felt more
of the presence of the Lord in some stifled-up room, where I
could scarcely breathe, than in some handsome chapels. And I
would sooner in my right mind speak in a little room with the
presence of God, than in the most splendid chapel and to the
largest congregation without it.

To be satisfied with the goodness of God's house is to be satisfied

with God's goodness in the Person and work of Jesus. There all
the goodness of God is seen and displayed; and O what a good
God he is in Christ! What grace and mercy, what favour and love
are manifested in the Person of Jesus! And when we see the
goodness of God's house, and feel how good and kind, how
gracious, favourable, and merciful he can be and is in the Person
of Jesus, that brings satisfaction. There is in him a righteousness
and atoning blood to satisfy all the demands of the law, and all
the cravings of a guilty conscience; there is a power that
satisfies, a love that satisfies, a salvation that satisfies; and
nothing else but these will satisfy. Now, when the soul is brought
near unto the Lord, so as to dwell in his courts, it begins to taste
a little of the goodness of God's house; and as it tastes the
goodness of God's house, that is, the goodness of God in the face
of Jesus Christ, it binds the soul to this house. You know,
goodness has a sweet attractive power; and as we feel goodness,
mercy, grace, and favour, it binds the soul to those courts; it is
satisfied with the goodness of God's house, even of his holy
temple; and with it can live and die, if God is pleased to favour it
with a sweet enjoyment of it.

Let us, with God's blessing, gather up the fragments of the loaf
that I have been endeavouring to break. We will look, first of all,
at the point we opened with—the original election of God. There
may be some here who kick at that doctrine; and perhaps may
have gone to such awful lengths as to speak against it
unbecomingly, and revile it as a doctrine horrible and hateful.
Now I will ask you one question, and appeal to your natural
conscience, for spiritual I fear you have none. Did not the Holy
Ghost by the pen of David declare, "Blessed is the man that thou
choosest?" Now, if you say, there is no such thing, is it not in a
moment sweeping away the blessing which the Holy Ghost has
pronounced? Rather look into your heart, and see why you speak
against what God has so plainly revealed. But God's people know
it to be the truth, that a man is blessed whom God has chosen.
Many of God's dear people, who are much tried about their own
election, whether God has chosen them, are perfectly satisfied
that God has an elect people; their trials and exercises do not
arise from doubts and fears about the truth of the doctrine; but
this is the point upon which they are tried, whether they are of
the elect. They are certain that God has a peculiar people; but
the question is, "Am I one of them?" for they are sure that none
but this people will go to glory. They say, "Has God put me
among them?" And it is good to have these exercises; they
establish the soul; they open the way for some sweet
encouragement, because sooner or later after these exercises
God's manifested mercy comes.

This, then is the root—the choice of God. The fruit is, being
caused to approach unto God. There may be some here,
(doubtless there are), who are saying, "O that the Lord would tell
me that I am one of his chosen!" Let me ask you a few questions.
Has God caused you to approach unto him? Have you felt the
barrier of a broken law, the guilt and shame of sin upon your
conscience; and yet at times have found all these hindrances
removed out of your way? Have you ever been enabled to pour
out your heart before the Lord, and vented your breathings into
his bosom, confessed your sins, and bewailed them with godly
sorrow? And do you ever feel any exercise of faith in your soul,
whereby, though perhaps with a trembling hand, you take hold of
God's promises? Remember her who touched the hem of Jesus'
garment; it was with a trembling hand; she did not rush boldly
forward, and seize the hem with a firm and vigorous grasp; but
she trembled as she touched, though she knew if she could but
touch it she should be made perfectly whole. Perhaps some of
you trembling ones have some of this faith; you could not come
presumptuously forward, but trembled as you took hold of some
promise lest that promise did not belong to you; and yet you
longed in your soul to embrace it. You have felt and found some
workings of love toward Jesus, though you could not say you
were sure that he loved you; yet there were some times and
seasons when you felt sure that you loved him. You could not
have loved him, if he had not drawn you near to himself. Have
you not found a secret strength breathed into your heart,
whereby you have wrestled with God at the mercy-seat, and said,
"I will not let thee go, except thou bless me?" (Gen. 32:26.) Have
you not felt some secret power, whereby you were enabled to
pour out your soul before him, and plead his promises? Then you
were a wrestling Jacob; and you will come off some day, and that
soon perhaps, a prevailing Israel. I would ask a little more, these
questions sometimes bring out the life of God. Have you not
found sometimes a little satisfaction in the things of the Spirit?
When you have read God's word, have you not sometimes had a
sweet light cast upon it, and felt a sweetness distilled out of some
branch of heavenly truth? When you have heard the ministers of
the Lord opening up and tracing out the experience of God's
people, have you not felt a responsive echo to the things taught
by the Spirit to the living family? And though perhaps it has only
lasted for a short time, yet there are times and seasons when you
have felt some inward happiness in the things of God, more than
you ever dreamt of in the world, or have since thought it possible
to enjoy, except by those who have the full assurance of faith?

Well now, if the Lord has caused you to approach unto him,
caused you to dwell in his courts, and if he is satisfying your
conscience that there is no real happiness but in himself,
notwithstanding the darts of Satan and the workings of your base
hearts, you are elected unto eternal life; God has chosen you,
though you cannot be certain that he has fixed his eternal love
upon you. Do we see the root of a tree? It is hidden in the
ground. We see the stem and branches, and sometimes pluck the
fruit. So election is the fruit of all the blessings that the soul ever
enjoys; and its approaching unto the Lord is the fruit of it.

Now, doubtless, there are some here, who cannot see the root,
but yet there is the fruit which they bear to God's glory; and the
Lord the Spirit has brought forth in their hearts and lives his
gracious fruits, though perhaps their minds are often fearing,
desponding, sinking, and fainting; and they cannot boldly say,
that God has chosen them unto eternal life. We see sometimes
the stream, but who can tell where the fountain rises? The noble
river Thames that flows through the metropolis, we see its
streams; but who here has seen the fountain whence those
streams gush forth? So the streams of mercy, grace, and truth,
may flow into a man's conscience, and yet he may be unable to
see the fountain and source whence these streams take their
eternal rise. But if there were no fountain there would be no
streams; the very streams show us the reality and existence of
the fountain. And thus because all here whose hearts God has
touched cannot see they are chosen, it does not from thence
follow they are not of the elect. It is a mercy to have the enmity
of the human heart against the doctrine slain. It is a mercy to be
brought to this spot, to feel that unless we are chosen we cannot
be saved. It is a mercy to know guilt, shame, and confusion of
face before God. It is a mercy to feel darkness of mind, and at
times to have it removed by the light of God shining into the soul.
It is a mercy to know one's own unbelief, infidelity, and
helplessness; for by knowing those things by divine teaching a
way is opened up for God to appear as removing all these
obstacles, and causing these mountains to flow down at his
presence. And in thus opening up a way for his grace and glory to
be manifested, he secures to himself all the praise and glory,
while the soul realizes its sweetness and enjoyment.
The Blessedness of Trusting in the Lord
(A Posthumous Sermon)

Preached at Gower Street chapel, London, on Lord's Day Evening,

July 18, 1869

"Blessed is the man that trusteth in the Lord, and whose hope the
Lord is. For he shall be as a tree planted by the waters, and that
spreadeth out her roots by the river, and shall not see when heat
cometh, but her leaf shall be green; and shall not be careful in
the year of drought, neither shall cease from yielding fruit." Jer
17:7, 8

What a dreadful thing it is to be under the curse of God; to have

his curse in our body, his curse in our soul, his curse in our
family, in our substance, in our goings out, in our comings in; his
curse in life, his curse in death, and his curse to all eternity. And
how the fear and apprehension of this curse has made the hearts
of many wither like the grass, filled them with gloomy
forebodings night and day, and made them sink under
apprehensions of dying in despair, and lying for ever under the
wrath of the Almighty. But on the other hand, what bliss and
blessedness there is in being under the blessing of the Lord; his
blessing in body, his blessing in soul, his blessing in our families,
his blessing in our substance, his blessing in life, his blessing in
death, and his blessing through all eternity. And as there are
many who have feared and trembled under his curse, when
events proved in the end there was no real cause for
apprehension; so many have rejoiced, or thought they rejoiced in
God's blessing, when it was all a delusion, for they were amongst
those who said they should be blessed, though they added
"drunkenness to thirst." Thus we must not altogether take our
fears and feelings, nor our doubts and apprehensions, of these
matters as certain indications whether we are under the curse or
under the blessing. But we must come to the word of God: that is
the grand arbiter; that is God's own judgment of these matters;
that speaks as the voice of God, and pronounces who, according
to the mind of God and the judgment of God, are under God's
curse; and who, according to the mind and judgment of God, are
under his blessing. Now I do not know a more remarkable
passage in the whole compass of God's word, to point out who
are under the curse and who are under the blessing, than my text
and the connection of it.

But the Holy Ghost, by the pen of Jeremiah, makes a contrast

between those who are under the curse and those under the
blessing; and he says of the former, speaking authoritatively in
the name of the Lord—"Thus saith the Lord; Cursed be the man
that trusteth in man, and maketh flesh his arm, and whose heart
departeth from the Lord." The Lord here does not lay down man's
moral or immoral character. He does not say, "Cursed is the thief,
the adulterer, the extortioner, the murderer, the man that lives in
open profanity." He puts all that aside, and fixes his eye and lays
his hand upon one mark, which may exist or does exist with the
greatest morality, and it may be with the highest profession of
godliness. "I will tell you," the Lord says, "who are under my
curse. This is the man that trusteth in man, that maketh flesh his
arm, and in so doing his heart departeth from the Lord." Now
taking a wide and general survey, who is there free from this
intimation of the Lord's eternal displeasure? Who can say he does
not trust in man and make flesh his arm? Why all have done it
and all will do it until they are taught better. The confidence of
most stands wholly upon this ground. They trust in man, in
themselves, or some other, and they make flesh their working
arm, to work out their own plans of salvation, build up their own
goodness, establish their own righteousness, and bring forth
something in and by the creature with which they hope to pass
eternity with God. But this is the point that God especially sets
his hand upon as marking them, that in trusting in man and
making flesh their arm, their heart departeth from the Lord; it
being impossible in God's view for a man to be neutral in these
matters; it being impossible in the judgment of God for a man to
trust in man, and make flesh his arm in one direction; and to
trust in God and make the power of God his arm in another
direction. God knows no such neutrality; he winks at no such half
measures; he does not allow a man to stand with one leg upon
self and one leg upon God; one foot on free will and one foot on
free grace; to work with his own right arm his own righteousness,
and take with his left gospel blessings. Such neutrality in the
sight of God is as bad as it would be in the case of a hot war for a
man, a subject of Queen Victoria, to stand neutral—be sometimes
in favour of the Queen, and sometimes in favour of the invader.
Such a man would deserve to be shot in the face of both armies.

"He shall be like the heath in the desert." You have seen,
perhaps, at Aldershot the sorry heath, a patch of rush, the
ground not being good enough to produce food for man or beast;
but it can produce a little stunted leaf, a few miserable rushes
that just relieve the dry sand, please the eye, but contain in them
no nutriment or utility. And so this man who trusts in man and
makes flesh his arm, is like the heath in the desert; with an
appearance of verdure and something like greenness and growth,
and yet, when examined, a miserable crop that benefits neither
himself nor anybody else; a few stunted starved specimens of
miserable heath, that cannot feed a lamb or even sustain a goat.
Such a man "shall not see when good cometh." Good may come
to others, but good will never come to him; a blessing may fall
upon the righteous, but no blessing shall fall upon him. Trusting
in man, departing from the Lord, he sets himself out of the reach
of God's blessing, puts himself into a place where God's mercy
falls not, and therefore never sees when good cometh, for there
is no good for him.

"But shall inhabit the parched places in the wilderness, in a salt

land and not inhabited." A religion merely in name and
appearance, without anything fruitful, god-like, or God-glorifying.
And thus he lives and thus he dies under the eternal curse of the
Almighty, as making flesh his arm and trusting in man. Now it will
be my object this evening, taking the words of our text, to
contrast with such the character on whom God has pronounced
his blessing; and you will see how the two differ in almost every
point; how the Holy Ghost with his graphic and vigorous pen, has
sketched both these characters and painted them in such life-like
colours, that each stands out as it were in contrast to the other,
that we may compare the two men in the curse and in the
blessing, see the dealings of God with each, and thus, if we be
under the blessing, gather for ourselves some good hope through
grace, and have some testimony that not the curse rests upon us,
but the blessing of the Lord which maketh rich and he addeth no
sorrow with it.

In opening up the text, I shall, therefore, with God's help—

I.—First, direct your thoughts to the blessedness of the man that

trusteth in the Lord, and whose hope the Lord is.

II.—Secondly, take up the comparison which the Holy Ghost has

given us: that such a man resembles "a tree planted by the
waters, and that spreadeth out her roots by the river."

III.—And Thirdly, speak of the fruits and blessings that spring out
of his being thus planted by the hand of God by the waters and
by the river: that he "shall not see when heat cometh, but his leaf
shall be green; and shall not be careful in the year of drought,
neither shall cease from yielding fruit."

I.—I intimated in the opening of this discourse, that we were not

to take our fears and feelings as certain marks and indications of
our state and standing before God. If we took our fears and
feelings at certain stages of our experience, we should draw
altogether a false conclusion. For instance, when the Lord begins
his gracious work upon a sinner's heart, he opens to him the evil
of sin; he sends the Holy Spirit with power into his conscience to
apply his law; and with the law comes a curse. So that whilst he
is in that state and stage of experience, under a sensible feeling
of the wrath of God in his conscience, under the application of a
fiery law, under the dismal apprehension of wrath to come, under
miserable forebodings of what his state may be for time and for
eternity, that man would draw altogether wrong conclusions if he
concluded he must live and die in this miserable condition; that
because he is now feeling the wrath of God, he will for ever feel
the wrath of God; because now under the curse of the law, he will
live and die under the curse of the law; and because he has
dismal forebodings of an awful eternity, it will be so on his death-
bed. We will take him at that stage, to throw a clearer light upon
the whole subject, and we shall see the Lord sends his law into
the man's conscience, and lets down a sense of his displeasure
into his mind, for the very purpose of breaking him off from his
trust in man and making flesh his arm, that he might not live and
die under the curse attached to those who do trust in man and
make flesh their arm. He, like others, trusted in himself; he, like
others, made flesh his arm in working out, as he thought, a
righteousness which would please God; in performing a number
of good works, to build up a Babel tower to reach to heaven, and
to satisfy the demands of a righteous law by yielding what the
law demanded. But wrath still pursuing, the curse still continuing,
fear still prevailing, bondage still settling upon him, he is taught
eventually by those means the folly of making flesh his arm and
trusting in man, in self, or anybody else. Thus preparatory to the
blessing comes the curse; before the gospel comes the law;
before the ceasing to trust man, and ceasing to make flesh his
arm, comes the breaking of the arm and the destroying of the
confidence in the flesh. Then taking him at that period, he is
brought to this point, that he cannot put trust in himself nor in
anybody else. Whenever he has put his trust in himself or
anybody else, he has met with nothing but disappointment;
whenever he has accepted anything from the creature, nothing
has followed but vexation, destroyed hopes, and blighted
expectations.

Now when he is in this state, the Lord begins to commune with

him from off the mercy seat; he draws him near to his gracious
self; he begins to open up his word to his apprehension,
enlightens the eyes of his understanding, drops some sweet
promise into his heart, and discovers his truth in its sweetness
and blessedness; or by some such operations of his grace—for we
cannot limit the Lord: he has various ways of unfolding his truth
to believing hearts—he brings this poor, tried, distressed, and
exercised soul to look unto him. And the more the soul is enabled
to look unto him, the more it sees in him his suitability to its
wants and woes. The more we look to the creature, the worse we
find it; the more we look to self, the worse we find it; the more
we trust in man or in one's own self, the greater is the
disappointment. But when we are drawn off from this vain-
confidence and enabled by the power of grace to see who and
what the Son of God is, and he is presented to our mind in the
word or in the sweet revelation of his Person and work, and the
Holy Ghost is pleased to take of the things of Christ and show
them unto us, and raise up a living faith in our soul, then we
begin to see and feel how worthy he is of our confidence. We see
his glorious Person, Immanuel, God with us, and all the glory of
God shining forth in his most beautiful and blessed countenance;
and this draws forth faith and love. And we see from time to time
what a wondrous work he came to do, and how he did it
completely. We are led to see how he came to put away sin by
the sacrifice of himself; to make reconciliation for iniquity; to
bring in an everlasting righteousness, and to do the whole will of
God. And we find as we look unto him, trust in him, and cast the
weight of our weary souls upon him, there is a stay, there is a
support, there is an encouragement which we could never have
found anywhere else. We have tried the creature, and the more
we leaned upon the creature the weaker it was. But when we are
brought off the creature and begin to lean upon the Lord, he
honours that faith by showing us what a strong foundation is laid
in his Person and work. Thus he sweetly draws us and
encourages us by his alluring grace to come out of our miserable
selves, in which there is nothing but confusion and
disappointment, and bondage, sin, and misery, and to come to
him and find rest and peace. And as we find the benefit and
blessing of so doing, and God's face begins to shine as the face of
the Father in Christ Jesus, and the Holy Spirit helps our
infirmities, then we begin to see what a suitable object of faith
this dear Son of God is; and the more we believe in him, the
sweeter we find him; and the more he draws forth faith upon his
glorious Person and work, the more darkness is dispelled from
the mind, the more bondage is loosened from the spirit, and the
more peace and consolation are felt in the soul. This is trusting in
the Lord. "Blessed is the man that trusteth in the Lord."

Now these lessons are taught us that we might ever make the
Lord our trust. Until we have had some discovery of this nature,
some bringing near of the Person and work of Christ, some sweet
teaching to make him known and precious, some revelation of his
Person, blood, and work, there is no trust in him, matters are so
at an uncertainty. But when he has made himself known and
precious, then he teaches us by these things to trust in him. Now
he is determined to make us trust in him at all times and all
seasons; because he won't continue these sweet feelings, nor
ever indulge the soul by setting it at rest. But he will teach us to
trust in him when we cannot see these manifestations. And thus
it may be he will bring upon us some trial in providence, or some
affliction in the family, or some circumstance in grace that shall
very much try the mind. Now, perhaps, we are losing sight of our
best friend by this time, and through unbelief and weakness, and
the fermenting infidelity of our wretched heart, beginning again
to trust in self and make flesh our arm. And what is the
consequence? The Lord does not appear, and we get into
bondage, confusion, and misery. Now the Lord has to teach us to
trust in him, and therefore he will bring those things upon us
whereby we shall have reason to trust him. If in providence we
go to a friend for help and find that help withheld; or if, trusting
in our own strength, we find it but weakness, our plans all
disappointed, our finest schemes all turned upside down: what
are we to do? Trust in the Lord; for all this is meant to bring us
out of self-confidence, and leaning upon an arm of flesh, to trust
in the Lord, and look to him and him alone. So it is in grace. It is
easy to believe when the Lord is present; easy to walk upon the
water when he upholds; but how are we in a storm? How do we
get on when circumstances threaten, and conscience accuses,
and temptations of various kinds start up—some to draw aside,
and some to alarm and threaten? Why, like Peter, we begin to
sink into the water. Now the Lord will teach us still to trust—not
to live by sense nor sight, but to live by faith in the Son of God;
to trust him in the dark; to look unto him, because there is
nobody else that can do us any good; to hang upon him, because
look where we will, all is darkness, confusion, guilt, and bondage,
except in him and through him. And thus, sometimes from sheer
necessity, having no other refuge, driven out of all other hope,
and having no other help—from sheer necessity, as in the case of
Esther when she went to the king—from sheer necessity, having
nobody else to look to, we are taught sometimes to trust in the
Lord. And we shall always find, sooner or later, if we trust in the
Lord and do not trust in ourselves—if we do not make flesh our
arm, God will honour that faith and crown that trust with his
manifested approbation. Therefore, "Blessed is the man that
trusteth in the Lord."

And is there not every thing in the Lord to draw forth this trust?
Look at his power. "All power is given unto him in heaven and in
earth." O what almighty power! Where can we find power in any
body else?—power in ourselves or power in a friend? All their
strength is weakness when it comes to the point; all their help,
when it comes to the push, fails and is broken. The Lord has all
power, both in providence and in grace, "The silver and the gold
are his, and the cattle on a thousand hills." He has but to speak
and it is done. So in grace: who can speak peace to a troubled
conscience but he? Who can take a load of guilt off the mind but
he? Who can calm anxious fears but he? Who can pardon sin,
forgive iniquity, heal backsliding, cast all our transgressions into
the depths of the sea, and reveal a sense of mercy and love, but
he? Thus we see he has all power; and when we can behold by
the eye of faith the heights, lengths, depths, and breadths of his
dying love, and see that those whom he loveth, he loveth unto
the end—that he never will leave nor forsake the objects of his
eternal mercy,—this draws forth out of the heart a trust in him, a
looking once more, as Jonah looked in the whale's belly—a
looking once more to him, even from the very ends of the earth.
Now this is a blessed man, who has the approbation of God upon
him, and sometimes a sweet testimony of God himself in his
conscience.

But it is said further of such a man, that the Lord is his hope; not
"in the Lord," but the Lord himself is his hope; because he is the
hope of Israel. And he is worthy of that hope. Wherever there is
trust, there will be hope, because hope is connected with trust,
grows out of it, and is the fruit of it. And it is this hope that
encourages the soul still to go on seeking his face, pleading his
word, and looking to him for a fulfilment in answer to prayer.
When trust begins to droop, hope droops with it; as faith
becomes weak in the soul, hope also languishes. But as faith is
drawn forth into living exercise, and with faith comes trust, then
hope lifts up its head as a co-worker with faith and love, and
strengthens itself in the Lord, as David did. Hope is compared to
an anchor, sure and steadfast, entering within the veil; and it
takes firm hold of the Son of God as an intercessor and mediator
between God and man. And thus the Lord becomes our hope. The
man who has this hope and who trusteth in the Lord, is
pronounced to be blessed. And though his hope may coexist with
many doubts and fears, many temptations and trials, many
sinkings and givings way,—for an anchor is only of use in a
storm,—yet still, the Lord being his hope, he will ride out the
gale; his ship shall not drive upon the rocks, but in due time it
shall enter the harbour of eternal rest. This is the man whom God
has pronounced blessed.

II.—But the Lord has given us a very striking figure, which I shall
now endeavour, with God's blessing, to open up. He compares
the man described in the text to "a tree planted by the waters,
and that spreadeth out her roots by the river." In those hot
eastern climes, trees cannot live or bear fruit except on mountain
slopes, or else when planted by rivers; for the power of the sun is
so intense, the atmosphere so dry, and the drought so lasting
that a tree withers and dies away for want of nutriment. The
heath may stand it in the wilderness, but the tree would die
under the drought that lets the heath live. Therefore, this man
whom the Lord has blessed, is compared to a tree planted by the
waters. By these waters we may understand the teachings,
testimonies, operations, work, and witness of the blessed Spirit,
water being often in Scripture a type and figure of the Holy Ghost
in his divine operations in the hearts of God's saints. And to be
planted by the waters is to be brought into contact with the
operations and influences, teaching and testimony of this holy
and blessed Comforter. God plants his people by these waters
that they may irrigate, so to speak, the roots of their religion;
that they may not dry up, wither away, and become fruitless and
worthless; but be so planted by the waters of God's grace in the
operations of the Holy Ghost as to keep their leaf green, make
the stem grow, cause the blossom to come out on the boughs,
and in due time the branch to bear fruit. And perhaps we may
consider the ordinances of God's house, the operations of his
grace under a preached word, the teaching of the Holy Spirit
privately in the soul, and his blessed intercession in the heart at
the throne of grace, as connected with these waters. It is a very
blessed thing to be brought where the waters flow with any
measure of purity and clearness; to be brought into contact with
a gospel ministry, so that the power of God's word in the ministry
may water your religion, keep your soul alive in the things of
God, strengthen your faith, hope, and love, confirm the good
work of God in you, bring forth the verdant leaf of profession, and
crown it with gospel fruit. And as the people of God delight in the
waters, as being so salutary and so refreshing, as they love their
gentle murmur, and delight in the coolness and refreshment
derived from them, they will bring themselves, and with
themselves their religion to these waters, that they may derive
from them the nutriment that God has put into them. It is
because these waters, like Shiloah's stream, flow so gently and
so stilly, that the Lord's people come from time to time to the
house of God to get their souls refreshed by the word, read the
Scriptures in private, fall upon their bended knee before the
throne of grace, and seek the Lord according to his own word:
"Asking ye shall receive; seek and ye shall find." And there, now
and then, these waters will gently flow into their souls, and it will
be found that they gently bathe the roots of their religion so that
it shall not wither and come to naught, but be maintained in their
soul with some degree of strength and verdure. We further read
that this tree spreads out her roots by the river. This river is
considered to be the river John speaks of, and which he saw in
vision; the river of the water of life. And Ezekiel saw it issuing out
of the Temple. It is the river of life and love. And it is a goodly
tree the Lord hath planted by the waters; it has roots—roots of
faith and hope and love; and these roots are very much in love
with this river, because it contains the waters of life and love
which irrigate these roots, mount up through the rootlets into the
branch, and make it green and verdant. The tree spreads out her
roots to the river that it may suck up all the nutriment it can; for
it finds there is such blessedness in having such a river of life and
love flowing by it, and such blessedness in having roots that can
dip into this river and draw life and love out of it into the soul, so
as to fill it with all joy and peace in believing. It is never satisfied
except its roots can get into the river of life and love and draw life
and love out of it. When the river seems to flow scanty and low,
the roots seem to dry up for want of contact with the river; and if
the roots begin to dry up, every thing suffers in the tree; because
the source of nutriment being cut off through the withering of the
root, there is no life or love drawn up from the river into the soul,
to spread itself over every spiritual faculty, as the water of the
river spreads itself over the literal tree. And thus these roots take
great delight in the river, because they find in the river a suitable
nutriment; it being designed for that purpose and flowing out of
the throne of God and the Lamb, to give life to this tree and
maintain it in verdure and being.

There are times and seasons, and many such in the soul, when
this river does not seem to flow into the roots: and we find the
misery of it. Darkness, deadness, coldness, bondage, worldly-
mindedness all creep in; and we find there is something wrong—
some gracious influence suspended, some communication
apparently cut off, something wanting in our religion that we
cannot supply, but which has to be supplied by the river of life
and love. And thus as the work is God's and not our own; as he
who has begun carries on; as he who gave the river gave the
roots, as he who gave the roots gave the tree from which those
roots spring, and as that tree is under his special blessing as a
tree of righteousness that his own right hand planted, he will take
care that in due time the river of life and love shall once more
flow, the roots shall once more dip into it, once more draw
nutriment out of it; it shall once more feed faith, hope, and love,
and once more the tree shall be manifested as a tree of
righteousness.

III.—And now to our third point: what is the fruit and

consequence of this?

First, he "shall not see when heat cometh." Here he is contrasted

with the man under the curse: he was not to see when good
came. He saw no good, because no good was wanted; and when
good came to others, good came not to him, because he was
under the curse of God as trusting in man. Now take the
contrast: this man is under the blessing of God. The Lord has
thoughts of peace, mercy, and love toward him. He has
pronounced him blessed, and he goes on to ratify this blessing by
giving him good which he did not give to the other. And as when
good came to others, good came not to the man under the curse,
because he trusted in man; so when heat comes to others, heat
does not come to the man who trusts in the Lord, or rather the
consequences; for heat may come without the consequences. The
heat that withers, dries up, and brings to nothing all other
religion, all other hopes, and all other confidence, does not affect
this man under the blessing of God, for he has a spiritual religion,
the roots of which are in the river. And, therefore, when the heat
cometh it dries up all religion whose roots are not in the river;
but it makes that thrive all the more which is fed by the river of
life and love. Instead of withering and drying up his religion,
acting together with the river of life and love, the heat only
makes it more fruitful. As in the man under the curse, good
comes to others, not to him; so in the man under the blessing,
heat comes to others to burn and dry them up; but it does not
come to him to burn and dry him up, because his roots are in the
river. If you took two trees, and planted one where there was no
water, and planted the other by the river side in a hot country,
the tree planted where there was no water would sooner or later
wither and die; but the tree planted by the rivers of water would
not wither and die, because the river flows by to keep it alive and
make it fruitful.
Temptation may be compared to heat. "Look not upon me,
because I am black." (Canticles 1:6.) The burning sun of
temptation withers up everybody's religion but his who is planted
by the rivers of water; sooner or later, all profession dries up and
withers except that which is of the operation of God. But God
takes care that neither the profession nor the possession of the
religion which he gives shall dry up and wither, because he takes
the tree of righteousness with his own hand, and plants that tree
by the rivers of water; and he keeps his work upon the soul alive
by enabling it to draw up through its roots nutriment to maintain
it in vigour, and make it fruitful in every good word and work.

But "her leaf shall be green." It is a very blessed thing for the live
profession to have a green leaf. How many once apparently green
leaves have become brown and withered and almost ready to fall
off. Is your leaf green? How stands your profession between man
and man? Do your families see greenness in your leaf? Do the
members of the church that you are connected with see that your
leaf still is green? And those amongst whom your daily business
lies, do they look to your profession and see it all withered, and
brown, and dry, like a tree in autumn, before the leaves fall; or
do they see a verdure and greenness about your profession that
commends itself to their conscience?

Now you never can maintain the leaf in any degree of greenness
or verdure, unless the roots of your religion are in contact with
the river of life and love. Your leaf is sure to get speckled,
spotted, brown, and withered, unless this blessed river of life and
love mounts up through the roots, fills it with sap and juice,
banishes the specks that would creep over it, and makes it green
and verdant. It is a blessed thing, and one might almost say a
rare thing, for man or woman, after many years of profession,
still to stand in the house of the Lord and the courts of our God
with a green leaf. Many seemed in times past to have green
leaves: where are they? Their leaf has become withered, their
profession dry, and they have been like the chaff which the wind
has driven away. If your profession stands for a single day with
any degree of verdure and greenness upon it, and is not spotted
and speckled or become brown and dry, it is only because there
is a river of life and love that bathes the roots of your religion.

"And shall not be careful in the year of drought, neither shall

cease from yielding fruit." "Careful" means as to the
consequences of the year of drought. Last year was a year of
drought; and the present season looks almost as if we shall have
a season of drought. Then we feel the want of water. When the
springs are low, the brooks dried up, and the rain ceases to fall,
we soon see the consequence upon the parched soil. Though this
may not apply to the present year, we have had already so much
wet and cold, yet were the hot, dry weather long continued, we
might suffer from a year of drought now as we suffered last year.
But this godly man is said not to be careful in the year of
drought, because he does not depend only upon the rain from
heaven, but upon the river which flows by—the river of life and
love. Therefore, he is not so careful in the year of drought, lest
the leaf wither and the fruit drop off, and he be thrown out of the
vineyard as a withered stump; because he knows that there is
this blessed river of life and love, the power of which is felt in his
soul; and whilst this river runs and his religion dips its roots into
it, the year of drought will not utterly consume him. He may
languish, as we may languish, under the burning heat; the
branches may decline; there may be a temporary effect come
over the whole tree. But still it will be protected more or less by
the river of life and love, so that it shall not be utterly burnt up.

"Neither shall cease from yielding fruit." God looks for fruit.
According to the parable, the Lord of the vineyard came every
year looking for fruit. Our Lord came to the fig tree expecting to
find fruit. "Every branch in me that beareth not fruit he taketh
away; and every branch that beareth fruit, he purgeth it, that it
may bring forth more fruit." (John 15:2) Now we never can bear
fruit by trusting to an arm of flesh, or leaning upon our own
doings and duties. It brings us away from the river of life and
love to lean upon an arm of flesh. But when we can (to refer to
the beginning of our text) trust in the Lord, and have the Lord for
our hope, and then feel some flowing in of the river of life and
love, then there will be a bearing fruit; and the bearing of this
fruit will prove the goodness of the tree, the goodness of him who
planted the tree, the blessedness of the river that waters the
roots of the tree, and the certainty that the whole is under the
blessing of God. But into what a narrow compass this brings most
people's religion. How it cuts down thousands as if with the heavy
strokes of a broadsword. Take all those in a profession or out of a
profession, who make flesh their arm and trust in themselves,
and see how the curse of God is upon them, and what a sweeping
of all these there is into destruction. Now take the reverse. Fix
your eye upon those whom God hath blessed, and ask yourself
how many you know, and whether you are one of those, who
have been brought by the work and witness of the Holy Spirit in
the heart, to trust in the Lord and to make the Lord your hope.
And look and see how far your religion stands not in the wisdom
of man, but in the power of God; and if it has a root to it; and if
these roots of your religion are fed and nurtured by being planted
by the waters, and sustained, and fed, and nourished by the river
of life and love. You may receive these things or reject them;
pronounce them mere babblings of narrow-minded, bigoted men,
or receive them as common truths on the testimony of God's
word. But my preaching, whether it be true or false, come short
or not of the reality, can never alter God's testimony. He has
recorded it with a "Thus saith the Lord." Those whom he has
cursed must be cursed, whatever blessing man may pronounce
upon them; and those whom God has blessed will remain
blessed, whatever curse man may denounce against them. We
must stand in one of those two positions: under the curse or
under the blessing; be under God's displeasure or under his
approbation. And therefore those who are anxious about their
souls and want matters right between God and conscience, will be
led from time to time to examine these matters in the light of
divine teaching, and weigh them up in the balance of the
sanctuary, that they may come to some clear understanding how
they stand for eternity. And O, if they can find themselves under
the blessing of the Lord, what a theme for gratitude, what a debt
of endless praise will flow from their lips, that the kind and
merciful Redeemer has had pity upon them and blessed them
with every spiritual blessing; and it will be their happy lot to bless
him who blessed them, and put his rightful crown upon him.
BLESSINGS IMPUTED, AND MERCIES IMPARTED

Preached at Eden Street Chapel, Hampstead Road, London, on

Lord's Day Evening, August 17 1845

"But of him are ye in Christ Jesus, who of God is made unto us

wisdom, and righteousness, and sanctification, and redemption:
that, according as it is written, He that glorieth, let him glory in
the Lord." 1Cor. 1:30, 31

These words, or rather a portion of them, came to my mind this

morning as I was sitting in the pulpit after I had done preaching.
And as I have usually found it far better that a text should come
to me, than that I should go to a text, I have been induced to
take them, and endeavour to speak from them this evening.

Some of my enemies, and alas, some of my professed friends,

have endeavoured to make out that it was my natural ability, or
my acquired learning, which enabled me to preach; though I
must say that I have but slender pretensions to either. But I
know, if either were the case, I should have the whole word of
God, and especially this chapter and this epistle against me: and
did I look to, or lean upon either, I had better have remained
where I was, in Babylon, than attempt to stand up in God's
name. But, through mercy, I have a witness in my conscience,
which contradicts such representations.

I believe I have the same perplexities and exercises with respect

to texts, and also with respect to sermons to be preached from
texts, as others of my brethren in the ministry. I know what it is
to be in thick darkness, and what it is to have a measure of
sensible light; I know what it is to be shut up, and what it is to
enjoy a degree of liberty; I know what the absence of life and
feeling is, and at times what is their presence; I know (to use an
expression of Brainerd's) 'what it is to work with stumps, and
what it is to work with fingers.' So that, with respect to both my
texts and sermons, I stand precisely on a level with my other
brethren. I have often to cry to the Lord to give me texts from
which to preach; and when I have got the text, to cry to the Lord
to give me matter out of it. For I know by experience that all
wisdom which does not come down from "the Father of lights" is
folly; that all strength not divinely wrought in the soul is
weakness; and that all knowledge that does not spring from the
Lord's own teaching in the conscience is the depth of ignorance.
To him therefore do I desire to look that he would teach me this
evening how and what to speak. And may he grant that a savour
from his own most blessed Majesty may rest upon the words that
may drop from my lips.

With respect to the text, we may observe in it three leading

features.

I.—The eternal purpose and counsel of God with respect to his

peculiar people—"Of Him are ye in Christ Jesus."

II.—The execution of that eternal purpose, in what Christ is

of God made unto this peculiar people—"wisdom,
righteousness, sanctification, and redemption."

III.—The final purpose and grand result of God's counsel,

and of its execution—"He that glorieth, let him glory in the
Lord."

I.—But it will be first desirable to point out who the people are,
concerning whom the apostle makes this declaration, "Of Him
are ye in Christ Jesus."

The word "ye," though it is but a monosyllable, though but two

letters compose the whole of it, yet has a vast meaning
connected with it. We must go to the beginning of the epistle to
know who are intended by this little monosyllable. "Paul, called to
be an apostle of Jesus Christ through the will of God, and
Sosthenes our brother, unto the church of God which is at
Corinth, to them that are sanctified in Christ Jesus, called to be
saints, with all that in every place call upon the name of Jesus
Christ our Lord, both theirs and ours." These are the persons to
whom the apostle addresses this epistle; these are the persons
comprehended in that little monosyllable "ye"—the church of God,
sanctified in Christ Jesus, called to be saints; with all who know
what it is, by prayer and supplication, to call upon the name of
Jesus Christ.

The "ye" then, in the text, means quickened souls, believing

characters; those who, by a work of grace upon their hearts, are
sanctified, and enabled, by a spirit of grace and supplication, to
call upon the name of Jesus Christ as their Lord and God.

Now, in the text, the apostle traces out what brought them into
this state of saintship, "Of Him are ye in Christ Jesus." The
expression refers to two distinct things: 1. The original purpose
of God; and 2. The execution of that purpose. Both are "of
Him."—flowing out of him, arising from him, purposed by him in
eternity, and executed by him in time. "Of Him"—not of
yourselves: "not of him that willeth, nor of him that runneth:" not
by the exertion of creature intellect, not by the instrumentality of
human operation, not by anything the creature has done, not by
anything the creature can do. The apostle traces up the standing
of Christ's people in him to its origin—the eternal purpose and
counsel of God. All that takes place in time he represents as
flowing out of the eternal mind, and happening according to the
original purpose and covenant plan of Jehovah.

You will observe, then, that when the apostle speaks of these
Corinthian believers as being "in Christ Jesus, " he intends
thereby to set forth their personal standing in the Son of God
under two distinct points of view:

1. As originating in eternity;

2. As taking place in time. In other words, every believer has a

twofold union with Christ; one from all eternity, which we may
call, an eternal, or election-union; the other in time, through
the Spirit's operation in his heart, which we may call a time, or
regeneration-union. Let us attempt to unfold these two kinds of
union separately.

1. Every soul, then, that ever had, has now, or ever will have a
standing in Christ, had this standing in Him from all eternity.
Just in the same way as the vine, according to the Lord's own
figure, puts forth the branches out of the stem; not a single
branch comes out of the stock but what previously was in the
stock: so, not a single soul comes manifestatively into spiritual
existence which had not first an invisible and eternal union with
the Son of God. This eternal, immanent, and invisible union with
the Person of Christ, God blessed his people with before all
worlds, by his eternal purpose, and according to his own eternal
counsel.

2. Now, out of this eternal and immanent union springs the

second union that we have spoken of, which is a time union—a
union in grace: a vital union betwixt a living soul and a living
Head. Until the Lord quickens elect vessels of mercy they have
eternal union, but they have not time union. Their eternal union
never can be altered: that never can be dissolved: that
accompanies them all through their unregenerate state: but their
vital, spiritual, and experimental union takes place in time,
through the teaching, and under the operations of the blessed
Spirit.

But what a mercy it is for God's people that before they have a
vital union with Christ, before they are grafted into him
experimentally, they have an eternal, immanent union with him
before all worlds. It is this eternal union that brings them into
time existence. It is by virtue of this eternal union that they come
into the world at such a time, at such a place, from such parents,
under such circumstances, as God has appointed. It is by virtue
of this eternal union that the circumstances of their time-state
are ordained. By virtue of this eternal union they are preserved in
Christ before they are called; they cannot die till God has brought
about a vital union with Christ. Whatever sickness they may pass
through, whatever injuries they may be exposed to, whatever
perils assault them on sea or land, fall they will not, fall they
cannot, till God's purposes are executed in bringing them into a
vital union with the Son of his love. Thus, this eternal union
watched over every circumstance of their birth, watched over
their childhood, watched over their manhood, watched over them
till the appointed time and spot, when "the God of all grace,"
according to his eternal purpose, was pleased to quicken their
souls, and thus bring about an experimental union with the Lord
of life and glory.

But this time union, this vital, experimental union, we may speak
of also under two distinct points of view.

1. Directly that God the Spirit is pleased to quicken the soul,

there commences a vital union with Christ. But this vital union
is not then known to the soul. What saith the scripture? "He that
is joined unto the Lord is one spirit." (1 Cor. 6:17) One spirit! The
Spirit that rests upon the soul to quicken it into spiritual life, by
that very visitation, that very indwelling, gives a vital union to
Jesus. But it is not at first known, it is not brought forth into the
soul's enjoyment, it is not made manifest in our personal
experience. It is, to use a figure that the scriptures have adopted,
like the process of grafting. Now we know that the process of
grafting is this. A scion is cut off an old stock, and grafted into a
new one. Before the scion can be grafted into the new stock, it
must be cut off from the old: but when it is cut off from the old,
and applied to the new, union does not immediately take place.
The wounded scion and the wounded stock are brought into close
apposition: they are joined together: and yet a time elapses
before the sap flows forth out of the new stock, so as to give the
scion a union to the tree. This may throw a little light upon
spiritual grafting. Though the soul is cut off from the old stock,
and brought into close apposition with the Lord of life and glory,
yet full union is not at once nor immediately enjoyed; though the
scion is cut off from the old stock, and grafted into the new,
joined together never to be separated, yet a certain time is
wanting that they may coalesce, that the cut stock and the cut
scion may both grow together, that the sap out of the living stock
may flow into the living scion.

2. When the Lord is pleased to bring the soul experimentally near

to the Son of his love, and communicates a measure of that
precious faith whereby Jesus is looked unto, leaned upon,
believed in, trusted in, hoped in, and cleaved unto, and a taste of
his love and blood is felt in the soul—that produces vital union.
Then, if I may use the illustration I have before adopted, the
scion and the stock are not merely in close apposition, as when
first grafted; but the scion and the stock grow together—there is
a coalescing between the two, a union never to be dissolved and
the sap out of the stock flows out freely into the scion, so that it
puts forth first its leaves of honest and tender profession, then its
blossoms of faith, hope, and love, and finally those "fruits of
righteousness, which are by Jesus Christ, unto the glory and
praise of God."

Now the grand struggle of a living soul before he feels this vital
union is to have it made manifest in his conscience. How many of
the Lord's people are in this state—cut off from the old stock,
coming, as far as they are able, unto Jesus, crying to be saved by
his blood and righteousness, desiring above all things to know
him and the power of his resurrection; yet no divine power
communicated, no inward testimony sensibly felt, no precious sap
manifestatively brought into their heart, no enjoyment of the Lord
of life and glory in their soul. Though there is an eye of faith to
see, a hand of faith to touch, an ear of faith to hear his voice, a
heart of faith to receive Jesus into its very secret chambers, yet
there is not brought about a clear, manifest, experimental union
with the Lord of life and glory.

But wherever this vital union is brought about, it is a union of

that nature which never can be broken: "Of him are ye in
Christ Jesus." See how the Holy Ghost, by the pen of Paul,
ascribes the whole to God; nothing is given to the creature to do;
not the weight of a straw is laid upon the back of freewill. God
does it altogether. In eternity, God ordained and gave the
everlasting union; and in time, by a work of grace, he cut the
scion off the old stock, brought it in close apposition to the new,
bound them round together, that they may never more be
separated, by the cords of faith and the cement of love; and in
time brought about also that close coalescing, that vital junction
between the two, which causes the sap to flow freely into their
souls, and make them abundant in every good word and work.

II.—We pass on to consider what flows out of this eternal, and

this time union—"Who of God is made unto us wisdom,
righteousness, sanctification, and redemption." Observe
again—we cannot observe it too often—how the whole is ascribed
to the Lord; how completely the creature is set aside; how
entirely man's wisdom, and man's exertions, and man's
righteousness are put into the background; and how the Lord of
grace and glory reigns triumphant. The apostle had ascribed the
eternal and vital union, which the people of Christ have with their
Head wholly to the purpose, and wholly to the execution of the
Father; and now what Christ is to his people, he also ascribes
wholly and solely to the same almighty and merciful God. "Who of
God"—observe, "of God"—that is first, by the eternal purpose
and secret determination of Jehovah; and secondly, by the
fulfillment of his eternal counsels, in the execution of his own
almighty appointment—who thus of God "is made unto us
wisdom, righteousness, sanctification, and redemption." The "us"
here are the same persons as the "ye." There is no distinction
betwixt the two. We are ye—ye are we. The apostle sometimes
addresses the church of God as distinct from himself, and he
sometimes addresses the church of God as one with himself. But
whether he uses we or ye the persons meant are the same—the
saints of God, the elect unto eternal life.

Now, to these, and to these only, Christ Jesus is of God made

"wisdom, righteousness, sanctification, and redemption."
The Lord knows the wants of his people. He knew in eternity what
they would need in time. The fall did not take God unawares. It
was not an interruption to his eternal purposes. It was not an
unexpected hindrance, which God never foresaw, never provided
for. God decreed it by his own permissive decree. There are
active decrees, and there are permissive decrees. There are good
things which God decrees, and which he himself performs: and
there are evils which God decrees, that out of them good might
come. But God does not put his hands to the execution of those
evils. He decrees to permit them, not himself to do them; for God
is not, and never can be the author of sin. We must make this
distinction, or we shall impute to God that which he hates. At the
same time, we must admit, that God decrees permissively, or the
whole chain of events would be thrown into a mass of confusion.
The distinction is beautifully set forth in what Peter said to those
that crucified the Lord: "Him, being delivered by the determinate
counsel and foreknowledge of God"—there is the decree—"ye
have taken, and by wicked hands"—there is the agency of man—
"have crucified and slain" (Acts 2:23.)

The Lord, then, foresaw what his people would be, and foreseeing
what his people would be—how completely ignorant, how deeply
dyed in guilt, how awfully depraved, how entirely destroyed—he
took care to provide a remedy beforehand. He set up, in his own
eternal counsels, the God-man Mediator, that he might be, in his
fullness, all that they should need in time, and enjoy in eternity.
For instance:

1. He saw that they would be sunk into utter folly: that all
the wisdom of man would be foolishness with God. "I will destroy
the wisdom of the wise, and will bring to nothing the
understanding of the prudent. Where is the wise? where is the
scribe? where is the disputer of this world? hath not God made
foolish the wisdom of this world?" God saw that when man fell
from original righteousness, he fell from all wisdom, and became
a fool, mistaking good for evil and evil for good, sweet for bitter
and bitter for sweet, light for darkness and darkness for light.
God knew that he would stumble upon the dark mountains, far
away from peace and righteousness. Therefore, knowing how
folly would be bound up in the hearts of his elect children, he
beforehand appointed Jesus to be their wisdom.
Now, I think, with respect to these four things which the Lord of
life and glory is said to be to his people, we may view them,
first, as imputed, and secondly, as imparted. Some who
hold imputed righteousness, object to imputed wisdom, imputed
sanctification, and imputed redemption. But why should we stand
aghast, as though this would lead us into the depths of
Antinomian licentiousness? If we take care to state that there is
imparted wisdom, as well as imputed wisdom; imparted
sanctification, as well as imputed sanctification: imparted
redemption, as well as imputed redemption; if we do not by
imputation destroy impartation—I do not see why we should
shrink from imputed wisdom more than from imputed
righteousness. Paul says, "Blessed be the God and Father of our
Lord Jesus Christ. who hath blessed us with all spiritual blessings
in heavenly places in Christ." (Eph. 1:3.) Is not wisdom a spiritual
blessing? and if this be "in heavenly places in Christ," is it not a
blessing by imputation? For what am I by nature? A fool: all my
wisdom, out of Christ, is nothing but the height of foolishness,
and all my knowledge nothing but the depth of ignorance. Can I
then ever be considered as wise? I can, if Christ is made wisdom
to me. If I have a standing in Christ, then I have a standing in all
that Christ is to me. Is Christ wise? the only wise God? infinitely
wise? unerringly wise? Is he Wisdom itself, Wisdom in the
abstract, set forth by that title in the Pr 8 8th of Proverbs?

Then if I have a standing in him, a living union with him, I am

wise in him, because his wisdom is mine. Can you find anything
in the stem that is not in the branches? Penetrate the branch—
does not sap ooze and flow forth? Penetrate the stem—does not
sap flow forth too? Take your microscope—examine both
minutely. Is not the sap in the stem and the sap in the branch
identical? Is it not so with respect to Christ and his people? Have
they an eternal standing in him? Have they a vital union with
him? Is he wise? Then they are wise. Not indeed wise as he is,
originally, eternally, intrinsically, infinitely: but wise because he
of God is made unto them wisdom.
But in what sense is Christ thus made "wisdom?" Not as the
second Person in the glorious Godhead, the eternal "Son of the
Father, in truth and love." As a Person in the Godhead, co-equal
and co-eternal with the Father and the blessed Spirit, he could
not be made. It is therefore by virtue of the eternal covenant
whereby he became a glorious Mediator, the Bridegroom of the
Bride, the Head of the church, and in due time by actual
assumption of the flesh and blood of the children, Immanuel, God
with us. In this way, the Lord Jesus Christ is made unto his
people wisdom, and they are thus accounted wise before God, as
having a covenant standing in Christ.

Now, how this sets all the Lord's people on a level! Some of them
are educated, others uneducated: some can scarcely, perhaps,
read the letters in the Bible; others have had instruction in the
arts and sciences: some have had deep spiritual teachings, and
the teachings of others have been more shallow. But do they not
all stand on one level when we view them as wise in Christ? Are
not all distinctions at once abrogated? Does not the wise man
naturally come to be a fool? Does not the fool naturally come to
be wise? Do not all the family of God who have a standing in
Jesus, by having Christ's wisdom imputed to them, stand upon
the same level—wise in Christ—because they are one in Christ?

But besides this wisdom by imputation, there is also wisdom by

impartation. Without imparted wisdom, we have no manifested
interest in imputed wisdom. Imparted wisdom is by the Holy
Ghost making the soul wise unto salvation: and his first step in
making the soul wise unto salvation is to convince it of its folly.
The wisdom of the world is foolishness with God, and the wisdom
of God is foolishness with the world. There must then be a
complete reversal—a turning of things upside down—before we
can be brought into a state to have wisdom divinely imparted.
But when we are brought into that spot where, I am convinced,
the Lord will bring all his people, that left to ourselves we are
perfect fools: that we have no wisdom whatever to direct our
feet: that we are blind, ignorant, weak. helpless, and utterly
unable to find our way to the city—when by painful experience we
stumble upon the dark mountains, and grope for the wall like the
blind, and grope as if we had no eyes, then we value the least
spark of divine wisdom communicated and dropped into our souls
from those lips into which grace was poured.

We must know the value of the gem before we can really prize it.
When diamonds were first discovered in Brazil, nobody knew that
they were diamonds. They were handed about as pretty, shining
pebbles. But directly it was known they were diamonds, they
were eagerly caught hold of, and their value rose a thousandfold.
So spiritually: until we are brought in our souls to prize the
teachings of God and the communications of divine wisdom—until
we can distinguish between the pebble of man's teaching and the
diamond of divine illumination—we shall neglect, we shall
despise, we shall not value divine wisdom. But when we are
brought to see and feel how, in every instance, we have erred
when left to ourselves; what mistakes we have made; what
backslidings we have been guilty of; what foolish things we have
said, and what worse than foolish things we have done;—when
we see folly bound up in our hearts, and stamped upon every
word and action, then how we prize any portion of that wisdom
which maketh wise unto salvation! and how at times we long for
the droppings in of that dew and power into our souls, which shed
abroad a sweet and unctuous light and lead the soul unto Jesus,
to find peace in him!

2. But Jesus is also made unto us "righteousness." Does not

this imply that we are unrighteousness? For is not all that Jesus
is, in exact proportion to our wants? So far as we are God's
people, we find all our wants precisely met by him. Can we find a
single spot into which a child of God can sink, to which some
character of the Lord of life and glory is not adapted? Does he
sink down as a fool before God? Does he feel such ignorance that
he scarcely knows what he is, or where he is? Are the scriptures
hidden from his understanding, his experience buried in darkness,
and he himself in his own eyes, the worst of fools? How suitable,
that Jesus, the Son of God, should be made unto him wisdom! Is
he made to feel himself a polluted wretch, and brought painfully
to know that all his righteousnesses are but filthy rags? that his
iniquities, like the wind have taken him away? that he has not by
nature one grain of that which is pleasing in the sight of God?
that all his motives, all his thoughts, all his desires all his actions,
all his words, bear upon them, bear in them, the deep-grained
dye of guilt? Does he shrink into self-abasement at the sight?
Does he loathe himself in dust and ashes? Does he feel that he is
only fit to be trampled into hell as a polluted worm? When
brought here, how suitable, how precious, is it to see that Jesus
is made unto him righteousness!

Observe the word. It does not say, that the obedience of Jesus is
made righteousness; but it says, that Jesus himself is made
righteousness. It is perfectly true that the obedience of Christ to
the law is the justifying righteousness of those that believe in his
name; "for by one offering he hath perfected for ever them that
are sanctified," and "by one man's obedience many are made
righteous." But besides that, the Lord himself is their
righteousness. Is not this the sure declaration of holy writ? "In
him shall all the seed of Israel be justified, and shall glory." "This
is the name whereby he shall be called, the Lord our
Righteousness." What a sweet view does this give of Jesus! We
look sometimes at Christ's righteousness as distinct from Christ.
Shall I use a figure? We look at the garment as distinct from the
Maker and Wearer of the garment. We look at the righteousness
so much, that we scarcely look at him who wrought out that
righteousness. Now, we must not separate Jesus from his
righteousness. We must not look merely at the garment, the
imputed robe, and forget him that wrought it out, that puts it on,
and that keeps it to this day in firm possession. But when we can
see, that not only the obedience of Christ, but Christ himself—all
that Jesus is—all that Jesus has, as the head of his church, as the
risen Mediator, as the great High Priest over the house of God—
when we can see that this God-man, Immanuel, is made unto his
people righteousness, how it expands the prospect! Then we look,
not merely at the robe itself, beautiful, comely, and glorious; we
look farther—we look at him that made it. We do not look merely
at the robe as distinct from him. We look at him who made that
robe what it is—Jesus, who ever lives at the right hand of the
Father to make intercession for us.
This, to my mind, is a sweet view. If I sink down into creature
sinfulness, shame, and guilt, and see Jesus made of God unto me
righteousness, what need I more? Has God made him so? Who
can unmake him so? Has God made the Son of his love
righteousness to my soul, that I may stand in him without spot,
speck, or blemish? Who is to alter it? Can sin alter it? That is
atoned for. Can the devil alter it? He is chained down unto the
judgment of the great day. Can the world alter it? They cannot
stretch forth their finger to touch one thread of that robe, to
touch one lineament of the Redeemer's countenance. If he is
made unto me righteousness, what more do I want? If I can find
a shield, a shelter, and a refuge in him as my righteousness,
what more can I want to preserve me from the charge of men or
devils?

But there is the impartation of righteousness, as well as the

imputation of it; and the impartation of it is the communication
of a divine nature to the soul. Not merely the sheltering of the
soul from the wrath to come by a robe cast around it, and by the
interposition of the Redeemer's glorious Person, but also the
breathing of God's image, the raising up of a new creature, and
the stamping of Christ's likeness on the heart.

3. We pass on to another thing that Christ is made to his people—

that is, "sanctification." What am I? What are you? Filthy,
polluted, defiled; are we not? Do not some of us, more or less,
daily feel altogether as an unclean thing? Is not every thought of
our heart altogether vile? Does any holiness, any spirituality, any
heavenly-mindedness, any purity, any resemblance to the divine
image dwell in our hearts by nature? Not a grain, not an atom.
How then can I, a polluted sinner, ever see the face of a holy
God? How can I, a worm of earth, corrupted within and without
by indwelling and committed sin, ever hope to see a holy God
without shrinking into destruction? I cannot see him, except so
far as the Lord of life and glory is made sanctification to me. Why
should men start so at imputed sanctification?' Why should not
Christ's holiness be imputed to his people as well as Christ's
righteousness? Why should they not stand sanctified in him, as
well as justified? Why not? Is there anything in Jesus, as God-
man Mediator, which he has not for his people? Has he any
perfection, any attribute, any gift, any blessing, which is not for
their use? Did he not sanctify himself that they might be
sanctified by the truth? Is he not the holy Lamb of God, that they
might be "holy, and without blame before him in love?" What is
my holiness, even such as God may be pleased to impart to me?
Is it not, to say the least, scanty? Is it not, to say the least, but
little in measure? But when we view the pure and spotless
holiness of Jesus imputed to his people, and view them holy in
him, pure in him, without spot in him, how it does away with all
the wrinkles of the creature, and makes them stand holy and
spotless before God.

But there is not only imputed sanctification, there is also

imparted sanctification. Have I one grain of holiness in myself?
Not one. Can all the men in the world, by all their united
exertions, raise up a grain of spiritual holiness in their hearts?
Not an atom, with all their efforts. If all the preachers in the
world were to unite together for the purpose of working a grain of
holiness in one man's soul, they might strive to all eternity: they
could no more by their preaching create holiness, than by their
preaching they could create a lump of gold. But because, by a
gracious act of God the Father, Jesus is made unto his people
sanctification, he imparts a measure of his own holiness to them.
He works in them to will and to do of his own good pleasure; he
sends the Holy Spirit, to raise up holy desires: in a word, he
communicates a nature perfectly holy, which therefore loves
holiness and has communion with a holy God; a heavenly,
spiritual, and divine nature, which bathes in eternal things as its
element, and enjoys spiritual things as sweet and precious. It
may indeed be small in measure; and he that has it is often
exercised and troubled because he has so little of it; yet he has
enough just to know what it is. Has not your soul, though you
feel to be a defiled wretch, though every iniquity is at times
working in your heart, though every worm of obscenity and
corruption is too often trailing its filthy slime upon your carnal
mind—has it not felt, does it not sometimes feel, a measure of
holiness Godward? Do you never feel a breathing forth of your
soul into the bosom of a holy God? Heavenly desires—pure
affections—singleness of eye—simplicity of purpose—a heart that
longs to have the mind, image, and likeness of Jesus stamped
upon it—this is a holiness such as the Lord of life and glory
imparts out of his fullness to his poor and needy family.

4. But lastly, he is made of God unto them "redemption."

Now, whatever Jesus is to his people, he is to them precisely
according to their wants. Are they fools? He is their wisdom. Are
they condemned? He is their righteousness. Are they unholy?
He is their sanctification. Are they captives and prisoners, who
have sold themselves under sin, and become slaves to Satan? Of
God he is made unto them redemption. His redemption is
imputed to them, is put to their account, is considered as theirs.
When Jesus died upon the cross, he purchased a peculiar people.
What he did then, and what he did there, is put to their account.
The debt that he paid is crossed out of the books. The sum that
he laid down is transferred to their account. Thus of God he is
made unto them redemption.

But besides that, there is imparted redemption, as well as

imputed redemption. What do I know of imputed redemption
unless I know something of imparted redemption? But what can I
know of imparted redemption, unless I have known what it is to
be a captive, in bondage, in hard chains, oppressed by cruel
slavery, unable to deliver myself, chained like a galley-slave to
the galling oar, bound down with fetters, so that I cannot release
myself? If I never have known that, how can I desire to know
Jesus Christ as of God made unto me redemption? But if I catch a
sight of Christ, as made unto me redemption, that communicates
a gracious feeling of redemption by impartation. No sooner does
the eye of faith catch what Jesus is made unto his people, than
what he is to his people comes instantaneously into their heart.
What he is to them, he is by imputation; and when they see
what he is by imputation, then they enjoy it by impartation. Do
I see redemption? Do I feel it, count it my own, and enjoy it?
Then what does it do for me? Does it not break, in a measure, the
chain of slavery? Does it not bring me out of captivity? Does it
not, so long as it lasts, subdue my lusts, and overcome my pride?
Does it not shatter the galling fetters of bondage? Does not faith
in Christ as my redemption, communicate a measure of that
redemption to my spirit? It does. This is the connecting link
between imputation and impartation.

God has made Christ all these to his people. He has set him up as
their eternal Head, made him the Bridegroom of their souls, that
out of his fullness they may all receive. Then, just in proportion
as they learn these two lessons—what they are, and what he is—
they receive him into their hearts anal they see actually what he
is to them in the purpose of God. Am I a fool? Do I feel it and
know it? Have I had painful experience of it, so that all my
creature wisdom is turned into one mass of foolishness? Do I
catch by the eye of faith a view of the risen Mediator, "Immanuel,
God with us," and see what he is made of God to us? The
moment my eye sees him as "wisdom," that moment a measure
of divine wisdom flows into my conscience. Am I polluted and
defiled throughout? Have I no righteousness of my own? Is all my
obedience imperfect? Am I unable to fulfill the requirements of
God's holy law? If once I catch by the eye of faith this glorious
truth, through him who is the truth, that Jesus Christ is of God
made unto me "righteousness"—the moment I see that by the
eye of faith, that moment a measure of imparted righteousness
flows into my heart? Am I an unholy, depraved, filthy wretch?
Does corruption work in my heart? The moment I catch by the
eye of faith Jesus made unto me of God "sanctification," that
moment a measure of sanctification comes into my heart,
drawing up holy affections, casting out the love of the world,
curbing my reigning lusts, and bringing my soul into submission
at his footstool. Am I a poor captive, entangled by Satan, by the
world, and my own evil heart? The moment that I catch this
glorious view, that Jesus Christ at the right hand of the Father is
made unto me "redemption"—if I can believe that he is made
such for me, that I have a standing in him, and a union with him,
so that he is my redemption—that moment a measure of
deliverance comes into my soul, and redemption imputed
becomes redemption imparted; the soul receives then internally
what Christ has done externally. In a word, when Christ is
received as "wisdom, righteousness, sanctification, and
redemption," he becomes all these in vital manifestation.

Now, do you see the steps? Just observe the connecting links.
What do we learn first? We learn, first of all, what we are by
nature. That is the first thing; there is no overstepping that.
Then, just in proportion as we learn what we are by nature, and
the Lord the Spirit unfolds the mysteries of the gospel to our
understanding, and brings a sweet revelation of them into our
conscience, do we see and feel what Jesus is made unto his
people: and we see and feel that he has everything our souls
want: that we have not a single necessity that there is not ample
provision made for in the gospel—not a need unsupplied—not a
malady without a remedy—not a sinking without a corresponding
rising. But what is the effect of it? Why, no sooner is this seen,
than a measure of it is communicated to the heart. First, I must
see what I am; secondly, I must see what Christ is; thirdly, I
must feel that Christ is all this to me: and when I see what I am,
and see what Christ is, and then feel a measure of what Christ is
for my soul, then Christ becomes to me inwardly what he is
outwardly. He becomes in my heart what he is revealed in the
word of truth; and this is the only way whereby we can have a
vital and manifest union with him.

III.—But this leads me to the grand crowning point—"According

as it is written, He that glorieth, let him glory in the Lord."
Man may glory. Yes: God has determined that man shall glory.
But in what, and in whom? In himself? No; God has for ever
trampled man's glory under foot. He shall glory, but he shall
never glory in self; for if he glory in himself, where God is, he
never will come. God's purpose is to stain the pride of human
glory.

"He that glorieth"—yes, we may glory; we may have a song of

triumph; if the Lord do but tune our hearts to sweet melody, we
may speak in accents of glory and thanksgiving—"he that
glorieth, let him glory in the Lord." Look at the words: "Glory in
the Lord." Not glory in himself, whatever he be—however deep
his experience, however great his abilities, however consistent his
conduct. No creature shall ever, in the sight of God, glory in
itself; but we may glory in the Lord as of God made unto us all
that he has determined he shall be. what a sweet losing of one's
self there is in Christ! See how he has raised up Adam's fallen
progeny! See how he has given the elect a standing in Christ
which they never had in their fallen progenitor! Adam could glory.
Adam had natural wisdom, creature righteousness, native
strength, and created innocency. He might glory in these. Just as
a horse can, without sin or shame, curve his proud neck, and
glory in his strength when he paweth in the valley, as Job speaks:
so Adam, in his native innocency, could glory in what God had
made him. But when Adam fell to the very depths of creature
depravity, all his glory was for ever lost: the pride of the creature
was for ever stained.

But God has determined that men may glory still: only he has
changed the object of that glory, and put that glory upon, and
centered that glory in his only-begotten Son. He turns the eyes
of his poor needy family to look to him for salvation, and to glory
in him: for "in him shall all the seed of Israel be justified, and
shall glory."

Sure I am, from the little I have felt (and it is but a little),
there never can be any feeling so sweet as to glory in the Lord
alone. Glory in my wisdom! Why, if I were to do so, there is a
worm at the very bud of that glory. There is misery in the very
feeling of self-esteem. Glory in anything I am! It is nothing but
"vanity and vexation of spirit." But if I lose myself, trample
myself under foot—cease from my own glory, strength, and
wisdom—lose it all, put it all aside, despise it as nothing worth,
and look unto him who "of God is made wisdom, righteousness,
sanctification, and redemption" to his people—I may glory then,
and my glory shall be this—may it be my glory in time, and may
it be my and your glory in eternity—to glory in the Lord—to glory
in his wisdom, in his righteousness, in his sanctification, in his
redemption—to glory in him for what he is in himself, and glory in
him for what he is to his people. This is a sweet absorption of the
creature into the Lord of life and glory. This is indeed taking off
the crown of human pride, and setting it upon the head of him
who alone is worthy to wear it.

This is indeed a sweet loss; to lose our own wisdom and obtain
divine wisdom; lose all that the flesh can boast of, and the flesh
can rejoice in—and find it all again heightened, shall I say?—no,
not heightened, for it is of a totally distinct nature—find it all of
different and more glorious kind in the Lord Jesus, as of God
made unto us "wisdom, righteousness, sanctification, and
redemption."
THE BLOWING OF THE GOSPEL TRUMPET

Preached at North Street Chapel, Stamford, on Thursday Evening,

October 28, 1858
A POSTHUMOUS SERMON

"And it shall come to pass in that day that the great trumpet shall
be blown; and they shall come that were ready to perish in the
land of Assyria, and the outcasts in the land of Egypt, and shall
worship the Lord in the holy mount at Jerusalem." Isaiah 27:12

Ever since the fall, man has been so deeply sunk in ignorance of
the only true God that it requires the special teaching of God in
the soul to make him wise unto salvation, and this teaching is not
always nor often felt to be of a very pleasant nature. Religion
must be burnt in us. We have not to learn lessons of consolation,
of sweet manifestations of Christ's love and blood, or sit at his
feet and listen to his words, as Mary, merely; but we need frowns
as well as smiles, the rod, and that very often, as well as the
encouraging look.

Whatever a man may have known and felt of the sweetness and
preciousness of the things of God in his soul, he soon forgets
them, and except the Lord revives the work again and again in
his heart, he soon slips into carelessness, carnality, and death,
unless the Lord is pleased to bring him into some trial, to exercise
his soul with some new rod or frown, and show him what he is as
a sinner, and what God is as a Saviour. We find all the promises
of the gospel made to the poor and needy. It seems as though
the Holy Ghost had to give everything that he could devise in his
love and infinite wisdom, to describe the state of man, and what
the saints of God feel when the Lord takes them in hand, to teach
them what is for their good.
We have not only a precious promise in our text, that "the great
trumpet shall be blown:" but a description also of those to
whom the promise is made; not only a description of the blowing
of the great trumpet, but of the characters also who hear the
sounds of the great trumpet—what they do and where they come
to worship—"in the holy mount at Jerusalem." But we have
also their state described, so that it seems as though they were
the last persons to hear, believe, and live. In opening up these
words I shall, with God's blessing,

I.—First, describe the characters spoken of in our text, which are

depicted in this strong expression, "those that are ready to
perish in the land of Assyria and the outcasts in the land of
Egypt."

II.—Secondly, the blowing of the great trumpet.

III.—Thirdly, what is the effect of the blowing of the great

trumpet, that "they shall come that were ready to perish
from the land of Assyria, and the outcasts in the land of
Egypt."

IV.—And fourthly, what they shall do when they come, "they

shall worship the Lord in the holy mount at Jerusalem."

Now I will not say that these words have not a prophetic
reference, so that they may have a bearing beyond an
experimental meaning; but I shall let that pass; because we
cannot have very clear notions of future events which may take
place. The words are applicable to the children of God now, and
instead of speculating, therefore, let us see how they bear upon
things present.

The first character, then, spoken of is one "ready to perish in

the land of Assyria." The Lord himself declares that none of his
sheep shall perish, but they are within a hair's breadth of
perishing; they never will sink into final despair, but they shall be
so exercised in their feelings as to be on the borders of it, like
that Amalekite, of whom we read, who was found after three
days and three nights in the desert, and there was no breath in
him; but they brought him to life, and gave him nourishment,
and he was enabled to tell of what had been done in Ziklag: so
the saint of God is brought very low and is almost gone when the
Lord comes and raises him up.

And what is there to prevent the Lord from casting that soul into
prison? Who is to pay one mite, much more all the debt? Now
when the Lord comes with power into a sinner's conscience, it
brings him off from all legal hope; he sinks down into a fit of
despair. He looks up and sees an angry God, and within a guilty
conscience. His prayers even, are mingled with sin, and the law
says, "Pay me that thou owest," and then he is ready to perish.
He cannot yield the obedience the law requires. The law never
knows pity nor pardon; but keeps saying, "Do and live, disobey
and die," and when any old sin, or all the long black catalogue of
his sins is laid upon his conscience, and he thinks how this holy
God has looked upon him from the days of his infancy to the
present moment, and what that eye has seen, nothing but one
long course of sin from the first hour that he drew his vital breath
up to the moment when his conscience feels guilty before God,
what anguish takes hold of him! He looks through all his life and
cannot find a single spot wherein he is not guilty, and he says of
his good actions they are vile! What he did in the service of God
so far from being done with an eye to God's glory was done from
hypocrisy! His profession seems to be the blackest thing of all his
black life. A man who feels this will feel ready to perish.

Again he is ready to perish with hunger. No one gives him aught

to eat. He may sit under a legal minister, he talks to those with
whom he is mixed up in profession, and as he does not know the
sweetness of the gospel he is ready to perish with hunger. He is
like the poor prodigal, there is bread in his father's house, enough
and to spare; but he is starving. Now the dead professors never
starve; for some can feed upon doctrines, others upon chaff, and
others upon legal duties, ordinances, and rites, and ceremonies,
duties in which the heart is not, and where there is not one
gracious feeling in the whole matter; but the living soul cannot
feed upon husks like these, he knows that nothing can save him
but mercy revealed to his soul, and if mercy does not reach his
soul, into despair he must sink, he must die an unpardoned
sinner; he is in feeling gone to despair; he cries to the Lord, but
thinks the Lord cannot hear; he reads book after book, but he
cannot see anything that suits him; he is a child of God in the
wilderness, and there is no water, no shadow of a great rock of
love, no dropping of the dew of God's favour; therefore, in this
wilderness he is falling in despair; he must hang on to something
about himself and he lays hold of self-righteousness.

A man will always cleave to himself, and when he is ready to

perish then he lies upon the sand without power to take hold of
anything; he stretches himself on the sand without power to lift
up a cry, and then he is ready to perish, and if he has had his evil
heart opened up to him very much, he feels that he can be
nothing less than a poor miserable creature. And Satan may
come in and tell him to put an end to himself. He will say, "You
are only adding sin to sin; because God will never pardon a sinner
like you."
This is a man ready to perish, and though all the saints of God
may not go so deep in the matter as this, yet they, for the most
part, are brought down to be ready to perish; for if they were
never ready to perish they would never hear the great trumpet
blow. Have you never fallen down before God at night and felt
that before morning your soul might be in hell? distressed in your
conscience, seeing what an awful sinner you were! What an awful
wretch! What a foul monster! If you have been exercised with
these feelings you know what it is to be ready to perish.

But there is another character. The text speaks of the outcasts in

the land of Egypt. There might have been a time with you when
you were thought a nice person, whether you were among the
church people or among the dissenters, you were everybody's
choice, hardly anybody had a better word than you, and as long
as you went with them they flattered you and you flattered them,
and you got on very well; but when life came unto your soul, and
the fear of God with life, and your conscience became tender
before God, and you began to see yourself a sinner, you found
that you could not hear the minister you did before, nor mix with
the people you did before, and they thought something had
happened to you, you were not so agreeable as you used to be; a
change had come upon you, and now you are a very disagreeable
person; you begin to find fault with the minister and the people;
to you nothing seems right without or within, for when our
consciences become exercised, and our eyes are in some
measure opened, we begin to see things as regards others.

You may have felt an outcast yourself, and it is a very painful

feeling until the Lord comes and tells us he has not cast us off;
but dead professors will cast us out if we don't sanction and
approve and give countenance to their deceitfulness and deceitful
actions, and if we speak conscientiously in these days. If we did
but know what hearts these were that are not guided by soul
realities we should understand how it is they cannot bear
anything that brings dissatisfaction; they would have everything
covered over.

But he whose soul is brought out of itself cannot sanction

anything of this kind; he must have matters straight between his
own soul and others. Therefore such a person must be a troubler,
and he will very soon begin to be an outcast. Now the first step is
to be cast out of the profane world and then out of the professing
world, even cast out by many who fear God, because perhaps
they have not walked in the same temptations, nor have they
been exercised by the same trials, and even if some of the saints
of God would receive us, we may feel ourselves cast out. All this
is a time of trial, and then there is a further and still deeper
trouble than that, which consists in feeling ourselves so vile,
base, and foolish as to be unfit for the notice of God or men, to
be cast out of the church and congregation as unfit for anybody's
notice, quite undeserving of anybody's approbation.

I don't say that all the saints of God have to feel this to the
extent I have described; but as a fisherman must cast his net
pretty broad to catch the fish, so the minister must cast the net
pretty broad to catch all the living fish. I don't mean to say all the
people of God go to the same depths of being "ready to
perish," or are to the same extent "outcasts." But they all must
know something of these states, and the depth of the work of
God upon their soul, for the most part, will be proportionate to
the experience of being ready to perish and of being an outcast.

The most painful is to be an outcast from God. What a painful

feeling, to have sinned against God to such a degree that he will
not take any notice of us, that he has cast us out, and will not
have anything to do with us any morel It is to be forsaken
apparently of God and man, and there is nothing left but to die
and to be put out of the way, or but a step between us and
death! And then the devil will say, "Why not take the final step?
What is there to live for, no friend or acquaintance to take any
notice of thee, God hiding his face!" If the saints of God are
outcasts of the world, the professing church, and seem
sometimes cast out of God himself, what is to hinder them then
from being cast into the lake of fire and brimstone?

II.—Why, what I come to in the second place, which is the

blowing of the great trumpet. It shall hinder them. The great
trumpet means the Lord's trumpet. It is a great trumpet
because God himself blows it, and he blows through it blasts that
waken the dead, which reach the ears of those who were ready to
perish and enter into their heart and conscience; but for this text
they would give up all hope and sink into despair. It is a great
trumpet, being a trumpet that will enter the ears of those ready
to perish, like the trumpet that shall waken the dead at the last
day. This trumpet is the trumpet of the gospel figured by the
silver trumpet, and it is to have a certain sound, or else it cannot
be known what is the meaning, what the trumpet sounds. It
resounds "Salvation! salvation! through the blood of the Lamb!"
These are the sounds that issue out of the mouth of this great
trumpet when the Holy Ghost blows it and gives it sweet melody.
Salvation for those who are ready to perish! Salvation for the
outcasts!

Now theirs are the ears which are open to hear the notes of this
great trumpet, and when the notes of the great trumpet reach
their ears and make a sweet melody in their hearts it awakens
them. Even some of you may have been or are now poor outcasts
of God and man, and you will know where and what you are, and
how your ears are open for the way of salvation, and every note
that drops into your soul causes a looking up to the source
whence that sound comes; as John in heaven, when he heard the
voice of the blessed Redeemer as the voice of the great trumpet,
turned to see the voice that spake unto him.

So when the soul hears the trumpet blow, he looks up to see

what the great trumpet announces. As you know, in a procession
you hear the sound of the trumpet, which tells you that the
procession is coming, and it directs your eye to where the
trumpet is. So it is when men hear the trumpet of the gospel,
they are all ears to hear what sound that trumpet may bring to
their hearts. What news! And when that trumpet begins to tell of
salvation and justification, and that salvation is all of Christ, who
is the justifier from first to last of all them that believe in the
work of Christ, the finished work, and mercy to poor sinners flows
through the atoning blood, it begins to raise up a feeling in the
soul to believe; then new life is communicated and it appears as
though the trumpet's sound had communicated help to the soul.

Like the soldiers in battle, though they may be weak and faint yet
as soon as they hear the trumpet's sound to call them "to battle"
they form themselves into their ranks and rush upon the enemy.
So in a spiritual sense, when the gospel trumpet sounds and the
Holy Ghost blows it, and the sound reaches the heart, it raises up
faith, hope, and love so as to move the depths of the heart and to
enter into the secret recesses and feelings of the soul. But it is
brought to this. There is salvation in Jesus Christ and in no other.
Here the door of hope is opened for the guilty, perishing sinner,
here God is seen a God full of mercy, compassion, and love; and
as the trumpet is sounding more and more, it falls with more and
more sweetness upon the heart, the grace, compassion, and
mercy of God seem to enter the soul, with every note that the
trumpet gives is Christ crucified and risen from the dead; but the
voice of Christ is heard in the whole, and where he speaks there
is life and power, faith and feeling, hope and love.
Has not your poor, dying, perishing, outcast soul sometimes been
revived by the preached gospel? Power has reached your soul,
and enabled you to believe in his blood and obedience and love;
for it has come with such power and sweetness into your soul
that it has raised you up and made you quite a new creature, and
then you feel life communicated to your soul, that you can
believe, hope, and love: it seems as though you could take one
leap into the bosom of Christ, and embrace him as the very
Bridegroom of your soul. The blessed trumpet makes such a
sweet melody in the ears and hearts of those ready to perish, and
of those poor outcasts who have neither hope nor help.

III.—And this brings me to my third point, What they shall do.

"They shall come that were ready to perish in the land of
Assyria, and the outcasts in the land of Egypt." They shall
come: before, they could not come; they were too weak: they
were ready to perish. What with the want of bread and water,
and what with their terrible feelings, they were "ready to
perish." They could scarcely lift one limb before the other to
come to Jesus, and they were such "outcasts:" they felt so
condemned, and so deserving of being cast out for ever and ever,
that come they could not, they did not know how, they had
scarcely a hope that he would take them, they were so afraid
they should be rejected; therefore they feared that they might
only add to their sin, hypocrisy, and presumption, and, therefore,
they stayed away.

They feared that the invitation, "Come, buy wine and milk without
money and without price," was not for them. But its freeness,
blessedness, and sovereignty now communicate such power to
their souls, and strength to their limbs, and hope and love to
their hearts, that come they must and will. Hence the trumpet
bids them "Come", the trumpet sounds in the ears of every
miserable outcast and backslider. The trumpet sounds in the ears
of all such, "Come ye to the wedding." As they hear these words,
and the words seem to fall in with their feelings and to be
suitable to them, then they come.
IV.—And to pass on to our fourth point, What do they do? "They
worship the Lord in the holy mount of Jerusalem." There is
a holy mount at Jerusalem, Mount Zion, where Jesus sits, and
where God has commanded the blessing, even life for evermore,
and as the Apostle speaks, "Ye are come to Mount Zion, and unto
the city of the living God, the heavenly Jerusalem." There is a
Mount Zion which represents typically and figuratively the gospel
of Jesus Christ and salvation by atoning blood and justifying
obedience; then they come to Mount Zion, and there they are
received favourably; for in Mount Zion there is not a single frown,
or anything that can terrify or fright back.

In Mount Zion the blessing is even life for evermore; so that

when the poor outcasts hear the trumpet they come to Mount
Zion and find every blessing that is in the power of God to bestow
and in the heart of Christ to give, and which is revealed in the
gospel. For this and for every other mercy to be manifested to
them, they come to the holy mount at Jerusalem, and they feel it
a holy mount. There God dwells in his holiness; for great is the
Lord and greatly to be praised in the city of our God, in the
mountain of his holiness. They have been taught how great he is
in a broken law; they have been taught he is a consuming fire.
They revere his great and glorious name; for he is just in the law
who is holy in the gospel, who is full of compassion. He is still
Holy! Holy! Holy! Lord God of Sabbaoth! and they find it is a holy
mount; for there are the holy promises and precepts, the holy
worshippers, holy enjoyments, holy affections, and holy desires.

It is a holy mount; for there holiness supremely dwells, there the

holiness of God is made specially manifest. Believers who know
anything of the gospel desire to have holy love, holy affections,
holy desires, to be holy inwardly and outwardly, without which no
man can see the Lord. When the gospel comes, it brings with it
holiness and power, which the law knows nothing of, and raises
up holy affections, holy desires and feelings; so that they find
that Mount Zion is not only a holy mount, but there they worship
the Lord in the beauty of his holiness, in the sweet enjoyment of
his manifested presence and love, and thus they worship Father,
Son, and Holy Ghost with a reverential awe of the great name of
God, and every spiritual and holy feeling that the Holy Ghost can
and does raise up in a broken heart and tender conscience.

Here we have in our text all that true religion is from first to last,
beginning with being ready to perish and being an outcast. Then
we have the work of the law upon the conscience, and what God
does to convince a man that he is a sinner, and make him to fear
his great name, then we have the middle where the trumpet is
blown, where the gospel blows its melodious tones, and where
the sinner comes drawn to Mount Zion by the sweet melodious
notes that sound from the holy mount. Then we have the
worshipping of the Lord in the holy mount at Jerusalem, being
filled with all holy desire, producing holy fruits, serving him in the
gospel of his dear Son; and here we have a sweet and most
blessed end.

Now have you experienced anything in the law or in the gospel, in

the precept or in the promise, in the teaching of the Holy Spirit
and the whole list of what the saints of God must know so as to
be saved with an everlasting salvation? Can you lay hold on any
part of this in your conscience that you have experienced in your
soul? Any part of it; for you may perhaps be one ready to perish
or an outcast, who sees nobody so bad as yourself, and fear that
you may be cast out for ever; or you may have heard with sweet
appropriation the melodious notes of the gospel, and delight in
what you hear as being a sound so suitable to you; or you may
have got to Jesus and there found pardon and peace, and you
may be at times enjoying his sweet presence and worshipping the
Lord in the holy mount at Jerusalem; but in his own good time
and way the saints will go through all these spots; and where the
Lord has begun, he will carry on, and no man shall pluck them
out of Jesus' hand.
THE BLOWING OF THE GREAT TRUMPET

Preached on Lord's Day Morning, August 1, 1852, at Eden Street

Chapel, Hampstead Road

"And it shall come to pass in that day, that the great trumpet
shall be blown, and they shall come which were ready to perish in
the land of Assyria, and the outcasts in the land of Egypt, and
shall worship the Lord in the holy mount at Jerusalem." Isaiah
27:13

How continually in the prophets, and especially in Isaiah, the

expression occurs—"The day of the Lord;" and sometimes, in a
briefer form, as in our text, "In that day." Great and memorable
events are almost always connected with "The day of the Lord,"
and "That day." There must then be something very noteworthy
in the expression as it occurs so continually, and events so great
are connected with it. And as, besides this, our text may be said
to hinge almost wholly upon it, it may be desirable to spend a few
moments in examining the meaning of the expression. The words
convey with them this idea, that it is a day or season for we
need not limit it to a period of twenty-four hours' duration
in which the Lord will be everything, and in which he will so
conspicuously manifest his greatness and power, so emphatically
make bare his arm, that it will be a day wholly Ins own; in other
words, a day in which man will be nothing, and God "all in all."
The leading idea then of the expression is, that it is a day of
power. But when we come to examine the context by the various
passages in which the expression occurs, we find that it is
sometimes spoken of as a day of great trouble and distress, and
sometimes as a day of great mercy and deliverance. Thus we find
in one of the prophets—"Woe unto you that desire the day of the
Lord! to what end is it for you? the day of the Lord is darkness,
and not light. Shall not the day of the Lord be darkness, and not
light? Even very dark, and no brightness in it?" (Am. 5:18, 20)
And again, "The day of the Lord cometh; for it is nigh at hand: a
day of darkness and of gloominess, a day of clouds and of thick
darkness, as the morning spread upon the mountains" (Joel 2:1,
2). We find also this declaration, "Alas! for that day is great, so
that none is like it: it is even the time of Jacob's trouble; but he
shall be saved out of it" (Jer. 30:7). In other passages, and by far
the moat numerous, we find the day of the Lord spoken of as a
day of special deliverance. "In that day shall this song be sung
in the land of Judah." "In that day thou shalt say, O Lord, I will
praise thee; though thou wast angry with me, thine anger is
turned away, and thou comfortedst me." So in the text, we read,
"It shall come to pass in that day, that the great trumpet shall be
blown;" the trumpet of deliverance.

But how can we reconcile these two different meanings of the

very same word, and make the scriptures harmonious and
consistent when the day of the Lord is sometimes spoken of as a
day of distress, and sometimes as a day of deliverance,
sometimes as a day of misery, and sometimes as a day of mercy?
There is no great difficulty in reconciling them. The day of the
Lord is, that special time or season, when the Lord puts forth his
hand, and manifests his almighty power. It is then equally "the
day of the Lord," when he brings down, and when he lifts up;
when he puts his hand to wound and kill, or to heal and make
alive. Thus gracious Hannah, in her sons of deliverance, ascribes
both of these works to the Lord. "The Lord killeth and maketh
alive, he bringeth down to the grave and bringeth up." As both
works are his, the day is also equally his. But we may also
reconcile the conflicting passages by observing that the day of
deliverance to God's friends is a day of desolation to God's
enemies, as the Red Sea bore striking witness.
The prophets too, had doubtless reference to that great day
which is still in the future—when there will be a greater
manifestation of the power of the Lord than earth has yet seen.

But not to dwell longer on this point, let us come at once to our
text, in which, I think, we may observe three distinct things;

I. The blowing of the great trumpet;

II. The characters in whose ears and hearts this great
trumpet is to be blown;

III. The effect which the blowing of the great trumpet

produces upon them.

I. There seems to be some reference here to the blowing of the

trumpets of which we read in the law of Moses. God, you will
remember (Numb. 10), bade Moses construct two silver
trumpets, which were to be sounded on all great and solemn
occasions. "Make thee two trumpets of silver; of a whole piece
shalt thou make them: that thou mayest use them for the calling
of the assembly, and for the journeying of the camps." These
trumpets were sometimes to "blow an alarm." "And if you go to
war in your land against the enemy that oppresseth you, then ye
shall blow an alarm with the trumpets; and ye shall be
remembered before the Lord your God, and ye shall be saved
from your enemies. Also in the day of your gladness, and in your
solemn days, and in the beginnings of your months, ye shall blow
with the trumpets over your burnt offerings, and over the
sacrifices of your peace offerings; that they may be to you for a
memorial before your God: I am the Lord your God." Thus every
day of gladness, every solemn festival, and every new moon were
to be hailed with the sound of the silver trumpet. But there was
one occasion on which, in a special manner, the trumpet was to
so blown,—the day of jubilee. We thus read (Lev. 25:9), "Then
shalt thou cause the trumpet of jubilee in the margin, 'the
trumpet loud of sound,' to sound on the tenth day of the
seventh month; in the day of atonement shall ye make the
trumpet sound throughout all your land." In the text there seems
to be an especial reference to the blowing of tins great trumpet in
the beginning of the jubilee, for the special mark of that trumpet
was that it was "loud of sound, and was blown throughout all the
land."

Looking at it then in a spiritual and experimental light, the

blowing of this great trumpet must certainly mean the preaching
of the gospel, the sweet melodious sound of sovereign grace, the
proclamation of mercy, pardon and salvation through the blood of
the Lamb. No other explanation can be tolerated for a moment,
for no other parallel can be found to the jubilee trumpet, at the
sound of which every captive Israelite returned to his city and his
family, every debt was cancelled, and every mortgaged acre
reverted to its original possessor. This great trumpet is then
spiritually blown when the gospel is faithfully preached. But be it
borne in mind, that though man may put this trumpet to his lips,
it is the Spirit of God who must blow through it. It is he that must
make it speak: it is he must who make it give forth its charming
notes, for no sounds but his reach the heart. II. But with God's
blessing we shall see more clearly what are the notes, the sweet
melodious sounds of this great trumpet, when we have viewed,
as we proposed, the characters for whom it is specially sounded.
These are ranked under two classes—"Ready to perish," and
"Outcasts." As the trumpet is sounded especially for them, we
gather by fair implication that it sounds for them only. Indeed,
none other require it; none other care for its melodious sounds;
on every other ear its notes do but jar discord.

But what a strange position must they be in, in soul experience,

before their ears are opened to hear the notes of this gospel
trumpet. "Ready to perish!" Many of the Lord's poor family are
here; and indeed, they are all here until they hear the trump that
bids them believe, rejoice, and live.

1. Some are "ready to perish" under convictions of sin, under

deep distress and anguish of mind. They feel in their consciences
that God is angry with them—that burning drops of his
displeasure are falling into their souls. When the guilt and burden
of sin are thus laid on their conscience they must needs feel
"ready to perish," for what is there before them but the pit?
"Ready to perish" indeed they are, for as David said of himself—
"There is but one step betwixt them and death."

2. Others of God's people, after the Lord has revealed himself to

their souls, and given them to feel their interest in the Lord Jesus
Christ, and thus realize a blessed assurance of his mercy, are yet
through the power of temptation often "ready to perish." Some
doubt this statement. But look at David's case. Had not David
received from God a solemn promise that he should sit upon the
throne of Israel? Yet, when Saul was pursuing him, "David said in
his heart, I shall now perish one day by the hand of Saul." But
had not God given him a testimony that he should not perish?
Had not Samuel anointed him with the sacred oil, and did not
David then believe as firmly as in his own existence that he
should sit upon the throne? Now no man can have a stronger
testimony nor a firmer assurance of his spiritual salvation than
David had of his temporal salvation, for in promising him the
throne, God certainly promised him deliverance from Saul. And
yet David feared he should perish by his hand. Why then should
not the same fears work now in the heart under similar
circumstances? If David's faith could fail, who shall say his own
may not? David's assurance was overborne by the imminence of
the danger; and so after the Lord has assured him he shall sit
upon the throne of glory, a real child of God may, through the
power of temptation, the assaults of Satan, and the fiery darts
that are cast into his mind, be brought into such circumstances as
to feel as much ready to perish in soul as David did to perish in
body.

3. Again; If the Lord permit any of his children, and he does

sometimes permit them, to go astray from him, to wander after
their idols, and get into a cold, dead state, they may, and often
do have many doubts and fears, whether they have not been
deceived and deluded altogether, and whether they are not now
abandoned to their own ways. Filled with fears, these are ready
to perish: they are, in their feelings, upon the brink of perishing.
They will not, and cannot perish, for they are held up by the
purpose and grace of God; but as in themselves without help, as,
like Ephraim, having "destroyed themselves," they are "ready to
perish"—all but perishing.

Now, it is for these that the great trumpet is to be blown; and it

needs must be a great trumpet, for they are great sinners: it
must needs proclaim mercy in very loud tones, for sin, carnality,
and Satan have so stopped their ears that they need a very
powerful note to pierce them and reach their heart.

4. Others of the Lord's people are in their feelings "ready to

perish," because they have not received those manifestations
of God's pardoning love which others are indulged with. Having,
therefore, no clear testimonies nor bright evidences, they feel as
if they had no real standing in the things of God, and therefore
are often "ready to perish." Many of the Lord's people hide these
feelings deeply in their hearts. Were they free to confess all they
felt and feared, many would acknowledge they were indeed
"ready to perish;" but amidst the confidence of others they are
afraid or ashamed to declare their fears. But besides these, we
read also of "outcasts;" and as there are those who are "ready
to perish in the land of Assyria," so there are those who are
"outcasts" in the land of Egypt. What is it to be an outcast? Jonah
well expressed its meaning when he said, "I am cast out of thy
sight" To be cast out of God's sight then is to be an outcast. A
sinner, in his feelings, is cast out of God's sight when he sees
himself too loathsome, too filthy, too base, too vile to dwell with
God; and, therefore, like filth or offal he is fit only to be cast out,
swept away out of the presence of God, for into his presence
nothing can come that is defiled. It is only as sin is opened up in
the heart and conscience as exceedingly sinful, that we begin to
loathe ourselves in our sight because of our manifold
abominations. Here was Isaiah in the temple (Isa. 6:5); Job in
the ditch (Job 9:31); Daniel by the river (Dan. 10:8); Peter in the
boat (Luke 5:8); and Jonah in the whale s belly; all saw light in
God's sight, and felt sin to be exceedingly sinful. Sin, sin, horrid
sin makes us feel outcasts. When there is no feeling access into
God's presence, when our prayers seem to be shut out, when
there is no answer to our petitions, when the heavens above are
as brass and iron, when there is no dropping down of the dew of
his favour, and no gracious smile upon his face, then is this
feeling in the soul, "I am cast out." So is God's church described
(Ezek. 16); under the figure of a new-born babe "cast out in the
open field;" so felt David, when he said, "Cast me not away from
thy presence;" so felt Heman when he cried, "Lord, why castest
thou off my soul? why hidest thou thy face from me?" so felt
Jeremiah when he exclaimed, "Waters flowed over mine head;
then I said, I am cut off."

The most eminent saints, when sin came between them and God,
felt they were, or deserved to be, outcasts. But where this
experience is in the soul towards God, it makes a man, in a
measure, an outcast also, in his feelings, from the church and
people of God. His language is, 'I feel too base, too vile, too
loathsome, too corrupt to have anything to do with them, or for
them to have anything to do with me.' To be an outcast from God
is to be an outcast from his saints. Many are kept by these
feelings from joining churches, or associating with the people of
God; and some have even been driven away from attending the
worship of God, reading the Scriptures, or using private prayer,
as viewing themselves outcasts from God and man, Cast out by
the world as a gloomy enthusiast, and casting himself out from
the people of God, such a one may well use Hart's words—

Lord, pity outcasts, vile and base,

The poor dependants on thy grace,
Whom men disturbers call:
By sinners and by saints withstood;
For these too bad, for those too good:
Condemn'd or shunn'd by all.

These, then, are the characters,—"ready to perish," and

"outcasts," for whom the great trumpet is to be blown. These hail
a free grace gospel, for it opens to them their only door of hope.
A duty faith gospel will never suit these. They are too deeply
sunk, too far gone, and in their feelings too utterly lost for
anything but mercy to reach, for anything but grace to save. It is
not a little salvation, nor a little gospel, nor a little Saviour that
can suit such; it must be free, sovereign, distinguishing, super-
abounding, or to them it is nothing. Thus, those things that seem
at first sight to set the soul farthest from God, are the very things
which in their issue are calculated to bring it nearest unto God;
whereas, on the contrary, those things that in men's eyes bring
them near to God, are the very thing's which in God's eyes set
them farthest from him. Look at the two characters in the temple.
See the proud Pharisee buoyed up with his own righteousness!
Was that man, as he thought, near to God? But what set him so
far from the Lord? His self-righteousness; it was that which set
him far from God; the pride which he took in his doings and
duties.

Now, look at the Publican, who in his own feelings was indeed far
from God, for "he dare not lift up so much as his eyes unto
heaven." But which was nearer to God, the broken hearted
Publican, or the self-righteous Pharisee? So when a man may
think himself nearest to God by his doings and duties, by his
obedience, and consistency, by this very self-righteousness he
thrusts himself from God; for he secretly despises the gospel of
Christ, makes himself his own saviour, and, therefore, pours
contempt on the blood and obedience of the Son of God. Thus, a
poor guilty sinner, who in his own feelings is ready to perish, and
but a miserable outcast, is brought near to God by the
righteousness of the gospel; while the Pharisee is kept far from
God by the wall of self-righteousness, which his own hands have
built and plastered. It is to the perishing then and the outcast
that the gospel makes such sweet melody. And why? Because it
tells them the work of Christ is a finished work; that the blood of
Jesus Christ cleanseth from all sin; because it assures them that
his righteousness is "unto all and upon all them that believe;"
because it proclaims mercy for the miserable, pardon for the
guilty, salvation for the lost, and that where sin hath abounded
there grace doth much more abound.

But something more is needed than the mere outward sound of

the gospel. Many of God's poor children, who in their own feelings
are ready to perish, may hear a free grace gospel preached in all
its purity, and yet only be condemned by it, because not able to
receive it, nor believe it, nor realize it. It therefore seems only to
add to their misery, to feel that the gospel is enjoyed by others,
while they cannot get a grain. But when the great trumpet is
blown by the mouth of the Spirit, it makes sweet melody, not
merely in the ear, but in the heart. The soul is then open to
receive it, and its sweet notes find a blessed echo there when the
Spirit proclaims pardoning mercy.

But what is the gospel? We talk much about gospel preaching, of

a free grace gospel, and so forth, and we will not hear any
minister who does not preach a free grace gospel. But what is all
that? We may have the gospel in our heads, and on our lips, and
yet not have a grain of the Gospel in our hearts; and we never
can have, and never ought to have the gospel in our hearts till we
are brought into those circumstances to which the gospel is
adapted. But whilst a child of God is passing through this part of
experience, how distressing it is to him! how his mind is
exercised, his conscience burdened, and his soul racked with a
thousand doubts, fears, and apprehensions! And yet how good it
is for him to be thus exercised! It gives him an ear to hear the
gospel, puts him into a situation to which the gospel is adapted,
and makes him feelingly and experimentally one of those
characters whom the Lord Jesus came to save; for "this is a
faithful saying, and worthy of all acceptation, that Christ Jesus
came into the world to save sinners; of whom I am chief" (1 Tim.
1:15). Christ came "not to call the righteous, but sinners to
repentance." He came "to seek and to save that which was lost."
These tidings suit him well; for he feels himself to be no common
sinner, but the chief of sinners; no ordinary transgressor, but a
rebel in chief; a desperate, out of the way wretch, to the depths
of whose wicked heart there seems neither end nor bottom. A
gospel, therefore, clogged and fettered by conditions, mangled
and shorn of its fulness and freeness, diluted and lowered by the
water of creature qualifications, is no gospel to him. It does not
reach his heart, come into his soul, touch his conscience, melt his
spirit, or raise up faith, or hope, or love. Nothing is so marvellous
and mysterious as the work of grace. It is marvellous in pulling
down and marvellous in raising up; and as mysterious as
marvellous. Here is one "ready to perish," and an "outcast." He
would be neither if he could help it; and neither has he made
himself. But such he is, and he must have help or die. Now to
such a one all but a free grace gospel is a mockery. It is taunting
a drowning man to stand on the bank and bid him swim for his
life. Leap in and save him. When brought to shore, be will bless
his deliverer. A poor guilty outcast, finds nothing so blessed as to
believe the gospel, and yet nothing so hard as to receive it; for
he can derive no comfort from it, except as it is applied by free,
sovereign, superabounding grace. The words are easily learned—
"free, sovereign, and superabounding;" but none can enter into
their divine import unless they are applied by the Spirit to the
heart. We hail poor souls ready to perish, outcasts in their
feelings; for these are the only persons who know what a free
grace ministry is; there is always some duty to be done by
everybody else; some sneaking, lurking self-righteousness not
rooted out. With others there is always some self at the bottom,
till the trials and distressing sensations which the "outcast," and
"ready to perish" feel, become brooms and besoms to rout out
that miserable fellow, self-righteousness. The holes and corners
have to be swept. There must be no duty faith, duty hope, duty
obedience. But let a man be well exercised in his soul, sin, Satan,
temptation, an evil heart, and a corrupt nature, with whole troops
of lusts and corruptions speedily will be up in arms against him;
and he will feel himself to be a poor miserable wretch without
either hope or help.

But you will say, Is there not an easier way of learning the gospel
than this? No. Must we then be "ready to perish" before the
gospel saves us, and "outcasts" before the gospel takes us in?
Yes, surely; for we are so already. The gospel does not make us
so, but finds us so. This was the confession that the Lord himself
put into the mouth of the Israelite when he stood before the
altar. "A Syrian ready to perish was my father" Deut. 26:5). To
see and feel ourselves "ready to perish" is but to see and feel our
real condition. It is like a person ill of consumption learning for
the first time the nature of his disease. To tell him so does not
make him so. It is only making known to him a terrible secret.
Now would not such a sinking patient hail and embrace a
miraculous cure? And would he quarrel with the remedy because
it perfectly healed him without his first making himself a little
better? So with the gospel. It reveals a certain, an infallible
remedy; but till we are ready to perish we slight and despise it.

"Few, if any come to Jesus,

Till reduced to self-despair,"

III. But when the great trumpet is blown, what is the effect
produced by its loud and melodious notes? "They shall come
which were ready to perish in the land of Assyria, and the
outcasts in the land of Egypt, and shall worship the Lord in
the holy mount at Jerusalem." They could not come before.
When "ready to perish" they could only sigh, and cry, and groan;
when "outcasts," there was no access to God, no power to
believe, to hope, or to love; but when the blessed notes of the
gospel trumpet sound in the soul, all these hindrances are
removed, and there is a "coming" to God. Now by this we may
know whether we have received the gospel into our hearts.

What does the preached gospel do for most hearers? Nothing at

all. It does not move, melt, soften, turn them, or have the least
divine effect upon them. Many hear the gospel preached for
years, but remain the same, nay, become worse, become, as the
term is, gospel-hardened. Where the hammer does not break or
soften, it hardens, as in the case of the blacksmith's anvil. The
weightier the blows the closer the steel. It is a sad thing to sit
under the gospel without having a case for the gospel. The
Pharisees who watched Christ when he healed the man with the
withered hand were hardened by a miracle of mercy before their
eyes; they had no case and needed no miracle. But where there
is a case for mercy, the "ready to perish," the "outcast," when he
hears the gospel trumpet, and it makes sweet melody in his soul,
comes. This coming shows that the trumpet is heard. When the
soldier hears the sound of the bugle he hurries to do what the
bugle bids. If it call him to quarters, he comes without delay. So
when the child of God hears the trumpet of recall, he comes; and
his coming is a sign that he hears and knows what the tones
mean. But how does he come? He comes as the gospel bids him
come, unto Jesus—"Come unto me all ye that labour and are
heavy laden." "To whom coming as unto a living stone." This
coming is "the obedience of faith." "When they hear of me they
shall obey me." They come humbled, broken, prostrate, and yet
with a sweet sense of acceptance in the Beloved, and are thus
brought nigh unto God. Now if any poor soul here has ever felt
the gospel in this way, in its freeness, fulness, and blessedness,
he has heard the sound of the great trumpet. But a Galatian
gospel, a mixed gospel, a free will gospel, a duty gospel, will
never thus draw sinners unto God. Such a gospel cannot remove
guilt from the conscience, and therefore gives no liberty of soul,
and no access into God's presence. A bound and imprisoned
gospel will always breathe its own spirit, which is bondage and
death. It proclaims no liberty, and therefore gives none. If ever it
speak of mercy it is frightened at its own words, and recalls or
qualifies them as soon as uttered. It is a gospel of uncertainties,
and therefore can give no sweet and blessed certainty of the
pardon of our sins, or acceptance of our persons; resting half its
weight on the creature, it can afford no assurance of our standing
in the Lord Jesus Christ, or of being bound up in the bundle of life
with the Lord the Lamb.

Now there may be some here, and they children of God, who
from want of light or the workings of self-righteousness cannot
altogether receive a free grace gospel. They are not enemies to
truth, but from some jealousy lest grace should be abused, think
we should not go so far in our statements, and that it is prudent
and wise to put the break on lest the gospel should get off the
rail. But let these good people examine well their experience, and
they will find it defective in two most important particulars. 1.
They are not ready to perish, nor outcasts. 2. They have not
received the spirit of adoption. And so long as they cleave to this
Galatian gospel they never will experience true liberty nor rejoice
in hope of the glory of God. These are kept from hearing the
melodious sounds of the gospel trumpet through self-
righteousness. But there are those of a very different class and
stamp, who are kept back by self-despair. Their language is: "I
have been so vile and base; I have been such a backslider; I
have wandered in my affections so far from God; my heart, too,
is so evil, my mind so carnal, my corruptions so powerful, what
shall I do? What shall I do?" But what can you do? Nothing is the
sum total of all you can do. Cast up all your doings and you will
find you must write, nil—nothing, at the bottom. Where then are
you brought? To this point, "ready to perish," an "outcast." Is not
this your very character, your precise condition? Beg then of God
to bring his gospel near, to sound the great trumpet in your
heart. Tell him that you are ready to perish and that he alone can
save.

Called then by the sounding of the great trumpet the perishing

and the outcasts "come." And what do they when they come? Do
they trifle with sin, mock God, and abuse his grace? We read not
so. They "worship the Lord in the holy mount at Jerusalem." They
worship him in Spirit and in truth, in the beauty of holiness. With
purified hearts, purged consciences, and spiritual affections, they
fall down before him, and their souls are impressed with the
greatness of his love. They had no such heavenly feelings before;
they could not therefore worship the three one God in the holy
mount, nor at Jerusalem. The great trumpet had not blown; the
jubilee had not come; the chains had not been knocked off, the
shackles not loosed, and the prison gates not thrown open. They
could not therefore worship God freely and fully with liberty of
access and freedom of spirit.

But where do they worship him? On the holy mount. The holy
mount we may understand to signify spiritually Mount Zion, the
place where Jesus sits in glory. This is the ancient declaration of
the Father;

"Yet have I set my king upon my holy hill of Zion." Here Jesus
ever sits with love in his heart, grace in his lips, and the gospel in
his hands. He sits on a holy hill, sways a holy sceptre, and rules
in the hearts of a holy people.

Men talk much of holiness; and indeed they may well talk of it,
for it is a most solemn declaration, that "without holiness no man
shall see the Lord." But what sort of holiness are most seeking
after? A holiness of the flesh, a sanctity of the creature. They
must do this and abstain from that; and if they do this and
abstain from that, then they are holy. So many prayers must be
said, so many chapters read, so many duties done. This is Popish
holiness, the sanctified austerity of a St. Dominic, not that
holiness without which no man shall see the Lord. That is of a
very different nature—different every way, in source, way,
means, and end. The only true holiness is that which is produced
by the Spirit of God in the soul. Other source or fountain there is
none. And how does he produce it? By the law or the gospel? By
the gospel certainly. When the great trumpet of jubilee sounds in
the soul, when it listens to the notes, and comes obedient to its
call, it is to worship the Lord in his holy mount at Jerusalem. True
holiness is then produced in the soul; for then there are given
spiritual desires, spiritual affections, spiritual views, spiritual
feelings, and spiritual hearts. This is the holiness which is
wrought in the soul by the Spirit of God, and without which no
man shall see the Lord. But what a strange way it is to be made
holy! Ere a poor sinner "ready to perish" will be holy, sin usually
makes terrible work with him. Satan thrusts hard at him;
temptation attacks him; lusts and corruptions knock him well nigh
to pieces; and he is "ready to perish" miserably under the
accumulated wrath of God. What holiness has now this poor
wretch? Judging by his own feelings, no more than Satan has;
aye, and unable to produce it, though he shed floods of tears, or
to find any one on earth to produce it for him. Can this be a man
for God? A man to whom the gospel is proclaimed? A man for
whom Christ died? Can this be a child of God and an heir of
heaven? What this poor wretch "ready to perish," this poor
"outcast?" Yes, he is the very person, an heir of heaven, a co-heir
with Christ, and on his way to glory.

But, you ask, is there to be no practical holiness, no obedience of

the hands, no consistency in the life? Yes, surely. But do not
confound cause and effect, root and fruit, source and stream. Is
this holiness produced by obedience, by doings, by duties? I read
not so. I find it thus—"In that day shall the great trumpet be
blown," the trumpet of the gospel, which proclaims mercy to the
miserable, and pardon to the guilty, which declares that Christ
has finished the work which the Father gave him to do, and
washed away sin in his own precious blood. The outcast hears,
believes, feels, realizes. As these heavenly notes produce sweet
melody in his soul, he comes to Mount Sion and to the blood of
sprinkling, which speaks better things than the blood of Abel.
There the Holy Spirit takes of the things of Christ, and reveals
them to his soul. He thus sanctifies him, and produces love to
Jesus, and obedience to the truth. Old things pass away, and all
things become new. This is spiritual holiness, a thing as different
from fleshly holiness, as heaven from hell.

Have you seen the matter in this light, and felt a measure of this
divine power and work? If not, I must say that you have never
yet heard the gospel trumpet. Self-righteousness is still working
in you. You love a Galatian gospel, because such a gospel suits
your self-righteous heart. But do not condemn others, and call
them Antinomians, because they believe and love a free grace
gospel. I believe in my heart and conscience, that every child of
God who is to be saved will experience these things, each in his
measure. The gospel has not two different sounds. The silver
trumpets were to be made all of one piece; and so is the gospel,
all of a piece. This trumpet gives a certain sound.

Now, this may explain why the gospel in our day is so much
despised. It is too pure, too free, too sovereign, too
superabounding. Most people like the gospel wine to be dashed
with a considerable mixture of water, because the pure wine of
gospel grace is too strong for them. But who are those that love
gospel wine? They are those that Lemuel's mother bade him pay
special attention to. "Give strong drink," said she, "to him who is
ready to perish, and wine unto those that be of heavy hearts. Let
him drink and forget his poverty, and remember his misery no
more." She was a wise woman, and she gave wise advice. What
was true then is true now. The heavy in heart still love the gospel
wine; and the perishing and the outcasts still come at the sound
of the great trumpet, and worship the Lord in the holy mount at
Jerusalem.
A Bold Challenge, but a Complete Answer

Preached at Gower Street Chapel, London, on Lord's Day

Morning, July 15, 1866

"Who shall lay anything to the charge of God's elect? It is God

that justifieth. Who is he that condemneth? It is Christ that died,
yea rather, that is risen again, who is even at the right hand of
God, who also maketh intercession for us." Rom. 8:33, 34

You find me again in the Epistles. I cannot say that as a minister

I should wish to be always found in the epistles; but I can say
that as a Christian I never wish to be found out of them. Let me
explain my meaning. I should be very unwilling so to tie up my
ministry with my own hands as to confine myself to any one
portion of God's word, however precious; yet, when I consider
the glorious doctrines, heavenly truths, encouraging promises,
and holy precepts which shine forth so clearly and so
conspicuously in the epistles, I could wish ever to live and at last
to die in the enjoyment of them. Not but what other parts of
God's word contain the same truths; but they are not developed
with that clearness, nor set forth in that full and bright light which
is shed over them as from a heavenly sun in the epistles of the
New Testament. Indeed it could not be well otherwise. They are,
excepting the Apocalypse, which is a prophetic book, the last
revelation which God has given to the Church, much of which
could not have been afforded to it at an earlier period. The
gospels give us the miracles, parables, closing scenes of the life,
the suffering death, and glorious resurrection of our Lord Jesus
Christ. There they stop. As historical records, inspired accounts of
the days of our blessed Lord upon earth, and containing the only
authentic testimony of his gracious words and actions when here
below, they have a place in the word of unspeakable value and
preciousness. But the epistles, as a fuller revelation of the truth
of God, bring before us the blessings and benefits which are
consequent upon his life, death, and resurrection. These blessings
demanded a special revelation which was committed to the
epistles as written by inspired apostles to the churches and
individuals; and when there were gradually collected together
into one volume, they assumed their present shape as an integral
portion of the New Testament. As such how blessed they are as
containing every thing which can serve to build up the Church on
her most holy faith. Where else do we find such glorious truths as
salvation by free, sovereign, superabounding grace, justification
by an imputed righteousness, pardon through atoning blood,
sanctification by the operations and influences, work and witness
of the blessed Spirit, full liberty of access to the throne of God
through the Mediator at his own right hand, and a certain
assurance that at the great day this corruptible body shall put on
incorruption, and this mortal shall put on immortality? It is true
that we have the elements and rudiments of all these glorious
truths in the gospels; but all rudiments are necessarily imperfect;
and therefore if I prefer the fuller to the scanty, the bright and
clear to the comparatively dim and faint revelation, who shall
blame me? We may love the epistles without ceasing to love the
gospels. Both have an equal place in our heart. Do we love John
14 less because we love Rom. 8? Is there any rivalry between the
teaching of the Lord and the teaching of Paul; between the
parable of the prodigal son and the doctrine of superabounding
grace? In the gospels we have the doctrines of grace in the bud,
in the epistles in the bloom; but as the rosebud is the same
flower and grows on the same branch as the full-blown rose, so
truth in the gospels is the same as truth in the epistles, and falls
little short of it in either beauty or fragrance.

But there is another reason why I speak much from the epistles.
Ministers usually are most at home in those parts of God's word
into which they have been specially led. That is the circle in which
they range with the greatest ease and comfort to themselves,
and generally speaking with the largest amount of profit to their
hearers. Now if there be any part of God's word into which I have
been specially led, and which I have chiefly read and studied, it is
the epistles. There are three things in them which have made
them my favourite study. First, I find that in them which so
satisfies my intellect. I hope the Lord has enlightened the eyes of
my understanding by his grace, and has thus given me a spiritual
intellect; and having cultivated it for many years by reading,
prayer, study, and meditation, I want something in the word of
God to satisfy my intellect thus graciously given. Do not
misunderstand me. I mean my sanctified intellect, my spiritual
understanding, for I am not speaking of my natural intellect,
which can understand only natural things but cannot receive the
things of the Spirit of God, but of that wisdom which cometh from
above, that anointing which teacheth of all things, and is truth,
and is no lie. Now I find in the epistles that which abundantly
satisfies and feeds my sanctified intellect, and fully and graciously
commends itself to my enlightened understanding. What a fund
of instruction is therein for a mind enlightened from above. Take,
for instance, the Epistle of Paul to the Romans. With what force of
gracious reasoning, with what strength of clear and scriptural,
and one might almost say cogent logical argument, has the
apostle opened up the counsel of God in the free and full
justification of a sinner by an imputed righteousness, and proved
every point in a manner so masterly in itself, from its harmony
with the Scriptures which he has advanced, and so satisfactory to
an enlightened understanding, that sometimes as we follow his
arguments, every word seems to carry with it the demonstration
of the Spirit and of power. Few persons, even ministers, speaking
comparatively, study the epistles. They read them and doubtless
get benefit from them; but they do not see the clear, connected
arrangement of every link in one chain of sustained argument,
and that the doctrinal portion of the epistle to the Romans is not
only a most blessed revelation of heavenly truth, but even,
viewed intellectually, is one of the greatest and most masterly
compositions which were ever penned by the hand of man.

But secondly, I find in the epistles, that which approves itself in

the highest degree to my conscience. There I find the blood of
Christ held forth most clearly to my faith, as cleansing from all
sin; there I find the way whereby God justifies a sinner set forth
in the fullest and brightest light, so as to bring peace to the soul;
there I see the love of God in the gift of his Son gloriously exalted
and magnified; and there I behold, set before my eyes, the "new
and living way which the Lord Jesus has consecrated through the
veil, that is to say, his flesh." These blessed truths approve
themselves to my conscience, as obtaining no relief but by being
sprinkled with the blood of the Lamb.

And I find in them, thirdly, that which approves itself to my

spiritual affections. I love the epistles because I love the truths
contained and revealed in them; and as I receive the love of the
truth set forth in them, it draws up my affections to where Jesus
sits at the right hand of God. I must therefore speak well of that
part of God's word, though not to the exclusion of other parts
equally precious, equally inspired, which so specially commends
itself to my sanctified intellect, to my approving conscience, and
to my renewed and heavenly affections.

But I have another reason still why I preach so often to you from
the epistles. In speaking to you, I address myself to a people who
are, or should be, an established people. It is about twenty-three
years since I first came amongst you, in my annual visit to the
metropolis. Many of you have been a considerable number of
years in the way, and therefore you do not stand in a position
requiring the mere elements of truth. The epistles were written to
churches, to those who were established in the faith. They are
therefore a part of God's word which is especially suitable to a
church and congregation not made up of novices, weaklings, and
beginners, but of those who are in some degree matured and
established in the faith as it is in Jesus.

But in fact my preaching so much from the epistles, either here

or elsewhere, needs no apology. I merely explain why it is, that
this morning, as on other occasions, I come before you with a
portion out of the epistles of the New Testament. Let the words of
our text speak for themselves. They want no apology, though
they may want a little explanation.

What, then, do I see in them, just to lead my own mind into an

orderly consideration of the subject, and to assist your memory?
I think I see these three things in them: An inquiry, an answer,
and a climax.
I.—First, I see an inquiry, double in form, though but one in
substance. "Who shall lay anything to the charge of God's elect?"
"Who is he that condemneth?"

II.—Secondly, I see an answer to that inquiry; like the inquiry

double in form, but double also in substance. "It is God that
justifieth;" "It is Christ that died."

III.—Thirdly, I see a climax, or a rising up, as the word means,

like a ladder, from one grand truth to another: "Yea, rather, that
is risen again, who is even at the right hand of God, who also
maketh intercession for us."

I.—It seems almost as if the apostle in our text took his stand
upon a kind of spiritual Pisgah. As Moses stood on Pisgah's top,
and thence surveyed the whole length and breadth of the land
which God gave the children of Israel for an inheritance, so Paul
seems here to stand upon a spiritual Pisgah, and takes a survey
of the goodly inheritance with which God has blessed his people.
Like Balaam, though not a Balaam, for that false prophet loved
the wages of unrighteousness—but as Balaam stood upon the
high places of Baal, and thence surveying the tents of Israel,
cried out in a prophetic rapture, "He hath not beheld iniquity in
Jacob, neither hath he seen perverseness in Israel;" so Paul
standing, as the man of God, where Balaam stood the man of the
devil, sees the family of God as Balaam saw the tents of the
children of Israel; and holding up his hand and opening his mouth
that all might hear, cries aloud, as with trumpet tongue, "Who
shall lay anything to the charge of God's elect?" A bold challenge,
and yet a challenge which he can meet at every point; a war
note, a trumpet of defiance, a glove thrown down by the king's
champion, and yet one for which he will do battle even unto
death, being assured of perfect victory for the cause which he so
boldly undertakes to maintain, were he even to die in its behalf.

Let us then examine this inquiry: let us see how the king's
champion approves himself in this combat. You and I, and all who
love the truth are ranged upon the same side; and though we
doubt not the issue, yet we will watch every turn of the fight.

i. But what word meets us at the outset of this inquiry? A word

very offensive to some, but a word very precious to others; a
note of war to enemies, a note of peace to friends. The word
"elect" meets us at the very gate, and stands on the threshold of
the inquiry. We cannot, then, pass it by, ignore it, smother it up,
evade it, or beat it down. With what holy boldness the apostle
holds it when he cries aloud, almost with a defiant voice, "Who
shall lay anything to the charge of God's elect?" But why should
men's bristles rise, why should men's nostrils dilate with anger,
why should men's eyes almost flash fire when the word "elect" or
"election" sounds in their ears? Is it so dreadful a word—so
terrible a term? Why should a man be a marked man who uses
the word and boldly proclaims his belief in the doctrine which it
enforces? Why is the doctrine itself so much objected to, for after
all it is the doctrine not the word which is so particularly
obnoxious? The main ground of objection is, that it is unjust that
God should have chosen some unto eternal life and passed by
others, thus leaving them to eternal woe. Now let us look a little
at this formidable objection, for time will not admit of my noticing
others which make, as some think, an equally forcible array
against the doctrine of election, especially as they may be easily
disposed of by the same answer.

I will assume, then, that you are an opponent to the doctrine of

election. Now let me ask you the following questions:—May you
choose your own house, or must another choose it for you?
"Well," you say, "I certainly think I have a right to choose my
own house: nobody can know what sort of a house I want so well
as myself." Do you think that anybody may choose for you your
friends, associates, and companions? "No," you answer; "I think I
ought to have liberty to choose my own friends and companions,
or those chosen for me might be very disagreeable or unsuitable
associates." Do you think that anybody has a right, if you are
unmarried, to fix upon a wife for you and say, "You must take
this woman for your partner in life, whether you like her or not?"
"No," you say; "I think it is part of our liberty as men to choose
our own wives." Now apply my figures to the point in hand. May
not God upon similar grounds choose his own house? Is not the
Church God's house—the temple in which he dwells; and has he
not a perfect right to choose his own habitation? Do we not read,
"The Lord hath chosen Zion; he hath desired it for his
habitation?" Had he not a right to choose Zion rather than Sinai,
and inhabit Jerusalem rather than Samaria? Had not Christ a right
to choose his friends and companions for all eternity? Had he a
right, for instance, to choose his own disciples? Should you think
it right to have let Judas choose them for him? that our Lord
should not have had any will in the matter to choose Peter, John,
and James, but that Judas should choose such men as he
pleased, men of the same stamp as himself, and say to the Lord,
"These men must be your disciples, friends, and associates on
earth?" Does not the very idea shock your mind and chill your
blood? Yet you are not shocked nor does your blood run cold
when you would choose this or that man to be the companion of
Christ to all eternity, and say it is unjust if the Lord has a choice
of his own, and does not accept yours. And had not the Lord a
perfect right to choose his own bride, his own spouse? Was any
spouse to be put upon him, and he accused of injustice if he
would not take her for time and eternity? So if you as a man are
at liberty to choose your own house, your own associates, your
own wife, do allow the Lord as much liberty in eternal matters as
you claim for yourself in temporal.

But you say, "Those are mere temporal matters, and do not
involve such important consequences. I must say still, it seems to
me unjust to take some to heaven and let others go to hell." But
by so speaking, you seem altogether to lose sight of the broad
fact that all men are criminals and justly condemned already by
their own deeds, and that there is no injustice in punishing the
guilty. Take the case, for instance, of a pirate crew, like the old
West Indian buccaneers, of whom we have read such tales of
bloodshed and massacre in the days of our boyhood, which has
been committing unheard-of atrocities, wading in blood up to the
knees, and ravaging the sea in all directions. At last, after a
bloody combat, the ship is captured by an English frigate. Now
every one of these pirates, with the captain at their head,
deserves to be at once strung up at the yard arm. But suppose
that only half of them are hung, or they are what is called
decimated, that is, every tenth man executed. It may seem to fall
very hard upon the victims; but is it an unjust sentence when all
equally deserve to be hung? Is it unjust to spare some and hang
others? So none can complain of God's injustice if all were sent to
perdition. Those who are spared are spared by grace, and those
who perish perish by justice. "The Judge of all the earth must do
right," as much when he burns up a guilty Sodom as when he
rescues a righteous Lot from the overthrow, or freely justifies a
believing though once idolatrous Abraham.

But I need not take up time and attention by dwelling upon points
so obvious to a spiritual mind. As to convincing those who set
themselves obstinately against the doctrine, it is, for the most
part, labour in vain to make even the attempt. But whether men
believe it or disbelieve it, one thing is certain, that the word of
God which has declared it will stand for ever, and that as no
opposition to it can disannul, so no adherence can make it more
certain.

But there is one important consideration, both for those who

receive God's word as he has revealed it and those who oppose
it, that the word "elect," according to our text, embraces and
comprehends all whom God justifies, all for whom Christ died and
rose again. It will, therefore, be our wisdom and mercy not to
cavil at and criticise the doctrine of election, nor mutter and
murmur against God's sovereignty in choosing some and passing
by others, but rather to ask ourselves this one simple question,
"Am I one of the elect? Have I any good ground to believe that
God has justified me freely by his grace, and that for me Christ
died and rose again?"

ii. But the apostle takes a prominent stand when he asks so

boldly the question, "Who shall lay anything to the charge of
God's elect?" What then? Does no one lay anything to the charge
of God's elect? Yes, certainly, many do. That is an every-day fact.
Publicly and privately many things are laid to their charge. The
apostle, therefore, does not mean that nothing is laid to their
charge, but that no charge shall so stand against them as to be
eventually their downfall. These charges we may briefly class
under two heads—false and true.

There are then false charges laid to the account of God's elect,
and these have to be fully met and answered that their state and
standing, honour and reputation may be clearly and fully
established. I doubt not that many, if not most of you, at some
time or other of your life have been subject to false charges. Few
things are more galling indeed to our feelings or more mortifying
to our mind than to be subjected to false accusations, for though
we know them to be false, yet many will believe them to be true;
and thus we may deeply suffer in our reputation, or a wound may
be inflicted through our side upon the cause of God. But what a
mercy it is when they are false; when before the face of God you
stand clear of the charge, and whatever may be laid against you,
you have the verdict of a good conscience that of that accusation
you are innocent. So in the things of God there are false charges
brought against his living family, not merely as regards their
personal character and reputation but simply because they
believe and receive God's truth.

1. How often, for instance, it is charged against God's people that

the doctrines which they profess to believe are dangerous and
lead to licentiousness. This is a false charge, and one which can
be met by them without fear. They know perfectly, from the
testimony of the word of truth and the approving verdict of their
own conscience, that the doctrines of grace lead to exactly
contrary effects, and that so far from leading to licentiousness,
they have, when spiritually received and experimentally enjoyed,
a most blessed and sanctifying influence upon their hearts, their
lips, and their lives.

2. Again, it is frequently laid to their charge that what they call

their experience is visionary, enthusiastic, comes from a brain-
sick imagination, or is but the sporting and wandering of a
deluded mind. How often relations bring such charges against
members of their own family, where the work of grace, to them
unknown, is going on in any one who comes under their daily
observation. How frequent is the insinuation that it springs from a
degree of insanity, or is some strange hallucination or delusive
idea which has possessed their mind. That is a false charge,
because we, who have experienced a work of grace on the heart,
know that the mind is never really sane or sober until enlightened
from above; that until we have some experience of the life,
power, and presence of God in our own souls we are madmen,
and that it is by the grace of God we have become sound and
sane. Does not the apostle expressly say, "For God hath not
given us the spirit of fear; but of power, and of love, and of a
sound mind?" (2 Tim. 1:7.) Festus said to Paul, "Thou art beside
thyself; much learning doth make thee mad." But what was the
noble answer of the apostle, though in bonds before his tribunal?
"I am not mad, most noble Festus; but speak forth the words of
truth and soberness." (Acts 26:25.) Thus we may turn the tables
upon our accusers. It is we who are of sound mind, and they
insane; theirs is the hallucination, theirs the enthusiasm, theirs
the fanaticism, to dream of going to heaven without a change of
heart or life. We see them maddened by the love of sin and the
world, and feel for ourselves that we, as taught of God, for the
first time in our lives, have right views, right thoughts, right
intentions, right words, and right actions.

3. Another false charge laid to God's elect is that they abstain

from open sin just to get a name or for fear of disgrace, yet love
to walk privately in all ungodliness; that if they can only just keep
a fair outside they think very little of the inside, whether it be
clean or unclean. This is a false charge. The Lord's people desire
to live free from all sin, secret as well as open, because they
carry daily and hourly in their bosom a conscience which testifies
against all ungodliness, private or public, open or secret,
committed in thought, committed in word, or committed in
action.
4. Another false charge is that they are a poor, moping,
miserable race, who know nothing of happiness, put away from
them all cheerfulness, mirth, and gladness, hang their heads
down all their days like a bulrush, are full of groundless fears,
and nurse the gloomiest thoughts in a kind of musing melancholy,
grudging all around them the least enjoyment of pleasure and
happiness, and trying to make everybody as dull and as
miserable as their dull and miserable selves. Is not this a false
charge? Do you not know that you never had any real happiness
in the things of time and sense, that under all your assumed
gaiety there was real gloom, that every sweet was drenched with
bitterness, and vexation and mortification stamped upon all that
is called pleasure and enjoyment; and that you never knew what
real happiness was until you knew the Lord, and were blessed
with his presence and some manifestation of his goodness and
mercy?

But then there are true charges; and true charges cut very deep.
If you were guilty of anything naturally that was laid to your
charge, if you had committed some crime or done something
manifestly wrong, your head must droop, your countenance fall,
and you feel full of inward confusion and shame. So, distinct and
apart from false accusations, there are true charges brought
against the elect of God in the court of conscience.

1. Moses, for instance, brings true charges. He says, "You have

not kept my law in thought, word, or deed; you have broken
every commandment, and brought yourself under its curse." Now
what can we say in answer to this charge? Have we kept the law
or have we not kept it? Have we loved God with all our heart, and
soul, and mind, and strength, and our neighbour as ourself, or
have we not? Let conscience give the verdict, guilty or not guilty?
What does conscience say? "Guilty, my Lord: I have not loved the
Lord my God with all my heart, and soul, and mind, and strength;
I have not loved my neighbour as myself; I have sinned in
thought, in word, in action; I have brought myself under the
stroke of God's law; I am justly condemned by its curse." Here,
then, is a true charge, and one which must be met and answered,
or we shall perish without hope under the curse and
condemnation of the Law.

2. Sometimes conscience also will bring a true charge. And, O,

who can stand before the charges of a guilty conscience when it
must own that the accusation is true? You may stand before a
false charge and lift up your head boldly before the face of the
greatest accuser if his accusation be groundless; but when your
own conscience bears its inward testimony to the truth of any
charge against you, at once you drop. Now conscience must
register many things against us: mine does, I am sure, and that
almost continually. Can you pass a single day of your life without
conscience registering some sin against you? You are kept, I
trust, from open evil; you are preserved, as I hope I am
preserved, from doing anything outwardly of which you are
ashamed, or that will bring reproach upon the cause of God; but
the inward workings of your depraved heart, the bubbling,
springing up, and oozing forth of that corruption which is innate
in us,—who can stand against the verdict of his own conscience
when it testifies against the inward evil that is ever discovering
itself? We must fall under that charge and acknowledge it is true.

3. Satan also will often accuse us, for he is called "the accuser of
the brethren." And O what charges Satan can bring against us;
what a memory the prince of darkness has. How he will take his
stand, as Bunyan represents Apollyon straddling across the whole
way, with his fiery darts, and bring to mind this or that sin
committed, this or that slip or fall, this or that backsliding; and
each fiery dart would strike through your liver had you no shield
of faith wherewith you could quench it. Some of his charges are
false, and some of his charges are true; but so confused often is
our mind, that we often cannot distinguish the true from the
false. Has he never represented to you that your sins were
unpardonable, or that you have committed the unpardonable sin
itself? Has he never told you that your backslidings are too great
to be forgiven, that no partaker of the grace of God ever sinned
like you, and that though there might be hope for others who had
not sinned so desperately and with so high a hand, there could be
no mercy for you? Has he not stirred up your mind by every vile
suggestion, and then tried to persuade you that all these base
and vile thoughts were your own, and that by them you have
provoked God beyond all patience and endurance? He thus so
mixes together true charges and false, that we scarcely know
what to say, think, or do.

But I must not dwell farther on this part of our subject. Take all
these charges in the aggregate: charges false, charges true, what
shall we say to them? We cannot fully answer them; we therefore
fall down before them; we dare not a word to say in our own
defence; like the woman taken in adultery, we have not a plea
with which to silence our accusers.

II.—Now God steps forth. The apostle, as his mouthpiece and

ambassador, speaks in behalf of the guilty criminal in those
magnificent words, those heart-thrilling accents which have
sounded with the sweetest melody to thousands of troubled
hearts and afflicted consciences: "It is God that justifieth."

i. What charge need we then apprehend if it is God that justifieth?

What has filled you, what may even now fill you with guilty
dread? Not your sins against man, but your sins against God.
Against his dread majesty, before his heart-searching eye you
have sinned; his law you have broken; his commandments you
have trampled under foot; his revealed will you have slighted: his
precepts you have neglected; the sins of your heart, of your lips,
of your life, have all been personal sins against a holy, pure, and
righteous God. We may have sinned, and doubtless have done,
against our fellow creatures, and would, if we could, repair any
damage which they may have sustained at our hand. Some,
perhaps, are dead whom we may have wronged, and others may
have forgiven or forgotten what we have done or said against
them. If we have wronged them in money, that we have repaired,
or can repair; and for other offences, which can not be well
repaired, we have felt inward grief, and confessed them before
the Lord. If, then, God, against whom we have so sinned, come
forward and himself freely and fully justify us, that is a full
answer to the inquiry, to the bold challenge: "Who shall lay
anything to the charge of God's elect?" That is a full reply to
every accusation, a full indemnification for every demand, and a
full receipt for every debt. But it must be God that justifies us—
not we justify ourselves. Only he against whom we have sinned
can justify us from our sins.

But I wish you to observe the scriptural meaning for it is full of

blessedness, of the word, "justify." To justify is not simply to
pardon or acquit. It is something far more than to acquit, for it
gives me a righteousness which I could not have by simple
acquittal. To explain this a little more clearly, let us just cast a
simple glance at the proceedings of our law courts. Look at a
criminal arraigned for an imputed crime. Some years ago there
was in Scotland a remarkable poisoning case, and the jury
returned what is called a Scotch verdict: "not proven." They did
not say the person charged was not suspiciously guilty; they did
not say there was not a measure of proof against the criminal,
but they held that the whole amount of proof brought forward
was not sufficient to justify them in bringing in a clear verdict of
guilty. The alleged crime was "not proven;" or, as we say,
proved. I have often thought that it would be good if in our law
courts it is permissible to return the same verdict, for it would
often more satisfy the public mind, and relieve the conscience of
the jury. "Not proven," therefore, is only just an escape from
"guilty," and is the very lowest form of acquittal. But there is a
step, what I may perhaps call a rise from this, as in our courts of
justice, where the criminal, when acquitted, is said to be "not
guilty," the jury declaring their belief that he has not been guilty
of the crime laid to his charge. But in some courts, as in a court
martial, there is another rise: "honourably acquitted," where the
accused is not only acquitted, but acquitted in a honourable
manner; or as we sometimes read, even in a criminal report, "he
leaves the court without a stain upon his character." Thus you
see in earthly courts there may be several degrees from "not
proven" to "honourably acquitted;" but even that falls short of
justification. A judge does not say, "Take that man and put a
royal robe upon him." The Queen does not bid her prime minister
honour him, as King Ahasuerus bade Haman honour Mordecai:
"Let the royal apparel be brought which the king useth to wear,
and the horse that the king rideth upon, and the royal crown
which is set upon his head." (Esther 6:8.) No man, however
honourably acquitted, was ever thought worthy of an honour like
that. But when God justifies a man, he not only acquits him, and
honourably acquits him, but puts on him a robe of righteousness,
a royal robe, in which he stands before God as holy as an angel of
light, spotless in the obedience, the glorious obedience of God's
own dear Son. Nor will even the royal crown be withheld; for for
him is prepared "a crown of righteousness," and like the four-
and-twenty elders whom John saw sitting, he will be clothed, not
only in white raiment, but have on his head a crown of gold, for
the Lamb has made him a king and a priest by redeeming him to
God by his blood. (Rev. 4:4; 5:9, 10.) O, what glory there is in
this heavenly truth, that you and I, if we believe in the Son of
God, though in ourselves poor, guilty criminals, are not only "not
guilty" in God's sight, are not only "honourably acquitted," but
are freely and fully justified by the imputation of Christ's own
glorious, immaculate righteousness, and so stand before the eye
of God without spot, or wrinkle, or any such thing. Such a
stupendous mystery may well fill our minds with holy wonder,
and as it surpasses all creature thought may seem too great to be
true. But nothing else could satisfy God, and, I may add, nothing
less than this could satisfy our own conscience. I should think
that a criminal who went out of court with a verdict of "not
proven" against him rather than for him, must hang his head
down somewhat before the gazing multitude, nor would he like to
meet afterwards in the street any of the jurors. Even when the
verdict is "not guilty," he must go out of court with some degree
of shame if the evidence bear strongly against him. Nay even if
"honourably acquitted," there might be still some suspicion left in
the mind of persons that there was some evidence kept back
which might have been brought forward, and he himself might
have felt stung with some part of the accusation as more than
half true. But to be covered with a robe of righteousness and
stand before a holy God as his dear Son stood, without spot or
wrinkle or any such thing, how this surpasses all thought of men
or conception of angels; yet, I repeat it, nothing but this can
satisfy God, and nothing but this can satisfy conscience. Were
there a wrinkle in our person you could not stand accepted before
God; His holy eye would rest on that wrinkle as an imperfection,
and you could not be admitted to his glorious presence while that
spot was upon you. Nor can conscience be satisfied with anything
short of that which fully satisfies God, for it is his vicegerent and
speaks in his name.

ii. But the apostle asks also another question, which I shall
answer at the same time with the present part of my subject. He
had asked, "Who is he that condemneth?" Now to condemn is to
go a step further than to lay a charge; for to condemn implies an
actual bringing in of the criminal as guilty. A charge might have
been laid, but not sustained; but a sustained charge brings him in
condemned, and if a murderer, shuts him up in the condemned
cell, there to abide till brought forward for execution. Now God's
people not only have charges laid against them, some false and
some true, but they are condemned, and justly condemned, by
the verdict of the law and by the verdict of their own conscience.
Still the apostle, unmoved, unshaken, stands upon the same
glorious height, and cries aloud, "Who is he that condemneth?
Look around, find the man if you can who can justly condemn,
effectually condemn, eternally condemn, in God's sight condemn
so that there shall be no reverse, any one of God's elect." Men
may condemn their, as they consider, dangerous doctrines, men
may condemn their experience, men may condemn their bigoted
views, men may condemn their uncharitable ways, men may
condemn their gloomy lives, and even condemn their very souls
to perdition, as our Christian poet said of Whitefield:

"The world's best comfort was, his doom was passed;

Die when he might, he must be damned at last."

But the question after all is, Does God condemn them? Does he
condemn the doctrines which he has himself revealed, condemn
the experience which his Spirit has wrought, condemn the life
which they live as a life of faith in the Son of God, condemn them
for walking in his way, and preferring his will to the will of man or
to their own, and will he in the end adjudge their souls to hell? Or
if they be justly condemned, as they are condemned by a holy
law and a guilty conscience, even that shall not stand. Why not?
Because Christ died. That is the answer, and the all-sufficient
answer. The apostle, you see, never lays the least stress upon
works, beginning or end. He has but two answers. To those who
lay anything to the charge of God's elect his answer is, "It is God
that justifieth." To those who condemn, his answer is, "It is Christ
that died."

But O how much is involved in this simple answer. How it meets

every charge, and if it cannot silence every accuser it effectually
quashes in the court of God every accusation.

III.—But this brings us to what I have called the climax. The term
climax is a Greek word, which literally means a ladder, and it is
used to signify that peculiar feature and striking figure in oratory
whereby the speaker keeps gradually rising in ideas and
language, mounting as it were from one summit to another in
sublimity of thought and expression, and carrying his audience
with him. Now Paul, who was by natural endowment a man of
consummate ability, of highly cultivated mind, as well as
eminently taught of God and writing under the inspiration of the
Holy Ghost, has given us in his epistles some beautiful instances
of this figure of oratory. The end of this chapter is a noble
instance of the power and beauty of climax. "I am persuaded"—
see how he rises—for to be persuaded is a step above simple
belief—"I am persuaded, that neither death, nor life, nor angels,
nor principalities, nor powers"—how he keeps rising from one
point to another; first, "death," then "life," then "angels," then
"principalities," then "powers," each one stronger than the other,
"nor things present, nor things to come, nor height, nor depth,
nor any other creature"—how he mounts! how he takes us to the
top of the ladder, the summit of the climax, "shall be able to
separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our
Lord." So in our text we have a climax, a spiritual ladder rising
higher and higher, its foot placed on the ground, but its top lost
amidst a blaze of heavenly glory. What are the steps? The first
step is "Christ that died;" the second is, "That is risen again;" the
third is, "Who is even at the right hand of God;" and the fourth is,
"Who also maketh intercession for us." It is as if he would crown
the whole of his argument with this beautiful climax—to give our
conscience thorough peace, and impart to us the blessed
assurance that whoever shall lay a charge, no charge shall be
sustained; whoever shall condemn, that condemnation shall fall
to the ground, and not for a moment be listened to in the courts
of heaven.

i. He begins, "It is Christ that died," as if that were enough to

answer every charge and silence every condemning tongue. For
what does the death of Christ imply? It implies a sacrifice; and a
sacrifice implies that the victim stands in the place of the person
who offers the victim. Blood-shedding and death were integral
parts of a sacrifice. "Without shedding of blood is no remission;"
without the death of the victim the sacrifice would not be
complete. Thus the words, "It is Christ that died," carry with
them these two things: 1, The shedding of his blood to put away
sins; and, 2, the laying down of his precious life, that by one
offering he might perfect for ever them that are sanctified. The
Holy Ghost expressly declares that "Christ once in the end of the
world hath appeared to put away sins by the sacrifice of himself."
There was no other way whereby sin could be put away. Nothing
short of the blood-shedding, sufferings, and death of the Son of
God could be such a propitiation for sin as God could accept. He
came to do the will of God; and that will was that he should offer
up his body and soul as a sacrifice for sin. He finished the work
which his Father gave him to do; nor did he bow his sacred head
in death until he could say with expiring breath, "It is finished."
There is no other relief but this for a guilty conscience; no other
answer but this to the condemning sentence of a holy law, or the
accusations of the accuser of the brethren. Now, if the sacrifice is
complete, that is a sufficient answer to the inquiry, "Who is he
that condemneth?" Moses condemns; but now Moses, viewing the
dying Son of God, says, "I am satisfied; I required a perfect,
unwavering obedience: it has been paid. To my law was attached
a solemn and tremendous curse; the Son of God has borne that
curse. I am satisfied; I have all that I called for. I have now no
charge to lay; I have now no condemnation to bring; I am
thoroughly and fully satisfied." Justice is next asked, "What say
you, Justice? Are you content?" "Yes; I am fully satisfied,"
answers Justice. "How so?" "All has been rendered that I could
claim. An obedience was necessary, an active obedience and a
passive obedience, that my demands should be fully satisfied. I
have got both in the Person of the Son of God, as suffering,
bleeding, and dying. His merits are infinite, for his Person is
infinite as the Son of God. I am, therefore, well satisfied, and I
have no further charge to bring." "Now, Conscience, what say
you?" Are you at peace; are you at rest; have you felt the
application of atoning blood, and received it as from God as
cleansing from all sin?" Conscience answers. "I am satisfied: all
guilt is taken away; it is removed by the blood of the Lamb: I
have no charge now to bring." "Satan, what say you?" But he
does not wait to answer. He has skulked off long ago. The prince
of darkness slinked away directly the question was put, and has
not a word to mutter from his infernal den. Ask, therefore, Moses,
ask justice, ask conscience, ask Satan; all are mute before a
dying Christ, a bleeding Lamb, all are silenced by a finished work,
an atoning blood, and an accepted sacrifice.

ii. But the apostle does not leave us there: he goes on with the
climax, steps up another round of the ladder. "That is risen
again."

Christ's resurrection was God's attesting seal to the truth and

certainty of Christ's mission and to his divine Sonship. If Christ
had not risen, there would have been no external, visible,
manifested proof that he was the Son of God. The apostle
therefore testifies that he was "declared to be the Son of God
with power by the resurrection from the dead." This, therefore,
has made Christ's resurrection to be such a grand cardinal
feature of our most holy faith; for upon it rests the grand and
glorious fact, that Jesus of Nazareth was the Son of God. And if
he was the Son of God, all that he did he did as the Son of God;
all that he suffered he suffered as the Son of God. His blood is
the blood of the Son of God; his obedience that of the Son of
God; his work the work of the Son of God; and all that he now is,
and all that he now does, he is and does as the Son of God. But
how do we know this? How can we prove it? What is our
evidence? It is all proved to a demonstration by his resurrection
from the dead. If it be blessed to view a dying Christ, it is also
blessed to view a risen Christ. "He was delivered for our offences,
and was raised again for our justification." This secures our own
spiritual and eternal life, as the apostle beautifully argues:
"Knowing that Christ being risen from the dead dieth no more;
death hath no more dominion over him. For in that he died, he
died unto sin once; but in that he liveth, he liveth unto God."
(Rom. 6:9, 10.) Highly do we prize, closely do we cling to the
cross of Christ. As we view him by the eye of faith bearing our
sins in his own body on the tree, we gather up the sweet
persuasion that those sins will not be laid to our charge. But
when we view him rising from the dead as a mighty conqueror
over sin, death, and hell, then our faith embraces him in the
power of his resurrection as justifying as well as in the
meritorious efficacy of his death as atoning.

iii. But the apostle goes on to rise another step in the spiritual
climax; he would take our thoughts one flight higher still: "Who is
even at the right hand of God." He takes us from earth to
heaven, lands us within the veil where our great and glorious
High Priest entered by virtue of his own blood, and shows us the
glorious Son of God at the right hand of the Father. The right
hand of God means the right hand of power, of dominion, of
authority, and of acceptance. When our blessed Lord went back
to the courts of bliss, and the gates of heaven lifted up their
heads, and the everlasting doors were lifted up, and the King of
glory went in, he sat down at once at the right hand of the
Majesty on high. But what did this place of preeminence imply? It
certified to principalities and powers, and the whole bright and
glorious throng of angelic hosts, that God had accepted his work
and given him for his reward that exalted place of power, of
honour, and of dignity. For remember this, that our gracious Lord
went up to heaven and sat down at the right hand of God in his
human nature. He did not go up to heaven as he came down from
heaven only as the Son of God. He went up to heaven as the Son
of Man as well as the Son of God. He went up to heaven in a
human nature united to the divine, and therefore entered the
courts of bliss as the God-Man, Immanuel, God with us. It is a
point of the greatest importance, and to be ever borne in mind by
every spiritual worshipper and by every true believer in the Son
of God, that our blessed Lord sat down at the right hand of the
Majesty on high in the same human body which he wore upon
earth—glorified indeed beyond all thought or utterance, but the
same pure, spotless, holy, and immortal humanity which he
assumed in the womb of the Virgin, and which he offered as a
sacrifice upon the cross. To this point the apostle would specially
direct our thoughts, and bring it before us as the object and food
of our faith. And what an object of faith it is, for, as viewing Jesus
at the right hand of God, we see there a mediator between God
and men, the man Christ Jesus; we see an advocate with the
Father, Jesus Christ the righteous; we see a brother, a friend, a
husband enthroned in glory, there ever living, ever reigning, ever
ruling, until God shall have put all enemies under his feet. He
would thus encourage us if we feel guilty of charges brought
against us and the stings of a condemning conscience, to look out
of them all and beyond them all, and say to all our accusers, "It is
Christ that died; what have I to do with your accusations, your
charges, your condemnation? I have got one who will answer
you.

'Does conscience lay a guilty charge

And Moses much condemn,
And bring in bills exceeding large?
Let Jesus answer them.'

I have one who can answer for me: it is he who died. But this is
not all; it is he who is risen again; nay, more, it is he who is even
at the right hand of God to plead my cause, to take my case in
hand, to meet my accusers, to sprinkle my conscience with his
blood, to shed abroad his love in my heart, to assure me that
none of these charges shall stand against me, and none of these
accusations shall ever be sustained for my full and final
overthrow." O, it is a faith in these divine realities which brings us
into immediate contact, into some sweet communion with this
glorious Mediator at the right hand of the Father. This brings us
out of ourselves with all our miseries to look to him with all his
mercies, and gives us to see there is more in Christ to save than
there can be in sin to condemn.

But for whom is all this? For believers. "For by him all who believe
are justified from all things, from which we could not be justified
by the law of Moses." I shall have occasion, I hope, in the
evening to speak from a text which has some reference to the
intercession of Christ, and I shall therefore not detain you longer
this morning by dwelling upon the last step of the ladder. It is
equally beautiful and equally blessed; but I shall defer the
consideration of it to the next assembling of ourselves together in
the name of the Lord.
The Branch of the Lord Beautiful and Glorious to Them that
are Escaped of Israel

Preached at Gower Street Chapel, London, on Lord's Day

Morning, June 20, 1869

"In that day shall the branch of the Lord be beautiful and
glorious, and the fruit of the earth shall be excellent and comely
for them that are escaped of Israel, and it shall come to pass,
that he that is left in Zion, and he that remaineth in Jerusalem,
shall be called holy, even every one that is written among the
living in Jerusalem." Isaiah 4: 2, 3

The prophetic declaration of the Old Testament Scriptures are

often very obscure, and, in consequence difficult to understand.
For this obscurity there are various causes; but it will suffice for
the present to mention two:

1. The apparently ambiguous language in which they are

couched; so that at times it seems uncertain whether we are to
understand them in a literal, or in a spiritual sense. Take, for
instance, such a passage as this, which you will find in the
chapter which I read this morning: "And they shall build the old
wastes, they shall raise up the former desolations, and they shall
repair the waste cities, the desolations of many generations."
(Isaiah 61:4.) Is that prophetic declaration to be interpreted
literally or spiritually? Will the time ever come when in the land of
Canaan, which now lies waste and desolate, there will be a
building up of the old wastes? Will there be a literal raising up of
the former desolations? Will the returning Jews actually repair the
waste cities, the desolations of many generations? And will
Palestine be again filled with flourishing towns and villages, so as
to be restored to its ancient populousness and prosperity? Or are
we entirely to ignore such an explanation, call it carnal and
earthly, unworthy of the spiritual meaning of Scripture, and
interpret the prediction wholly in harmony with the preceding
verses, which are undoubtedly claimed by our Lord himself as
descriptive of his work as anointed by the Spirit of the Lord? If
so, you would probably interpret the desolations as signifying the
desolations of the soul, and the waste places that are found in
spiritual experience as built up and repaired by Christ being
anointed "to comfort all that mourn; to appoint unto them that
mourn in Zion, to give unto them beauty for ashes, the oil of joy
for mourning, the garment of praise for the spirit of heaviness;
that they may be called trees of righteousness, the planting of
the Lord, that he might be glorified." (Isaiah 61:3.) If, then, you
adopt the literal meaning, you might find a difficulty in reconciling
it with the spiritual, as explained by the Lord himself; but if, on
the other hand, you wholly discard the literal meaning, you might
find a difficulty in another direction in so positively denying the
literal interpretation of the word of God, for you might carry out
the same principle of interpretation in all other passages of
similar import, and thus overthrow the literal meaning of God's
word altogether. My own belief is, that the literal meaning of the
prophecies does not contradict their spiritual interpretation, but
that each has its place; as was the case with the prophecies
concerning Christ, of which those that predicted his literal birth at
Bethlehem, his being born of a pure Virgin, his literal sufferings,
death, and resurrection have their place in the prophetic page,
and were as much fulfilled as those which spoke of his spiritual
sufferings and of the travail of his soul. Is not Isaiah 53 eminent
instance of both the literal and spiritual meaning of prophecy
meeting and harmonising in our blessed Lord? And why should
this not be the case also in other predictions now apparently
ambiguous and obscure?

2. But there is another reason for their obscurity. Very many of

these prophetic declarations have not yet received their
fulfilment; and therefore, until fulfilled, they will always be
obscure. Look, for instance, at the many intimations that were
given in the Old Testament Scriptures of Christ's sufferings and
death to which I have just alluded. Were they understood by the
Old Testament believers before the coming of Christ? Could they
understand, for instance, and explain Psalms 22, 40, 69, or Isaiah
53, as we understand and explain them now? But when the man
of sorrows came, and Messiah appeared as a suffering Messiah,
then those Old Testament Scriptures that spoke of his sufferings
became plain and clear. So it will be doubtless with many
prophetic declarations which are now obscure. They will one day
be fulfilled to the very letter. There will be no uncertainty or
discrepancy then between the literal and spiritual interpretation;
but each will be seen to have its own distinct fulfilment, and all
that obscurity which now arises from the apparently ambiguous
language in which they are couched will then perfectly disappear.

"But," it may be asked, "If this be the case; if you say these
prophetic declarations are so obscure, why do you preach from
them? Why not leave them in their original obscurity? Do you
think you can explain them, or give us any understanding of their
true meaning? Had you not better leave them, if they are so
obscure as you make them out to be, and take some plainer and
simpler text in which there is no such obscurity?" Let me then
answer this objection. These prophetic declarations may be
obscure as regards their fulfilment prophetically, and yet may
contain a vast deal of spiritual instruction. We may not
understand them altogether in their prophetic, and yet may find
great instruction in them in their spiritual and experimental
aspect. In endeavouring, therefore, this morning, to open up the
words of our text, I shall leave aside altogether their prophetic
aspect, and confine myself to their spiritual and experimental
meaning; and I hope you may be able, with God's help and
blessing, to gather some instruction, or encouragement, or
consolation, or even warning, if need be, or reproof, or
admonition which may benefit your soul; for God's word is written
with such infinite wisdom and depth of spiritual meaning, that, if
we are taught by the Spirit, we shall always find something in it
suitable to our case. Bear this in mind, then, in reading the word
of prophecy, that whatever may be the fulfilment of these
prophetic declarations in times to come, there will be not change
as regards the fundamental verities of the everlasting gospel.
Grace will always be grace, as the heart of man will always be the
heart of man. Whether the Jews be restored to their own land or
not, whether converted to Christ or not, God's dealings with his
people, when all these prophecies are being actually fulfilled, will
always resemble his dealings with them in every age and every
clime. Without redemption by the blood of Christ, without
regeneration by the Holy Spirit, without faith, and hope, and love
in the Lord Jesus, of what avail would be any literal restoration of
the literal Israel? They would be Jews still with all their present
unbelief, infidelity, and enmity against the Son of God. Whether,
then, there be a literal fulfilment of our text or not, does not at all
affect the spiritual instruction contained in it; for in this sense,
these prophetic declarations have a daily and continual fulfilment
in the soul of the believer from age to age and generation to
generation, though they wait the future for their complete
fulfilment. It is this peculiar feature of the prophetic Scriptures
which makes them so edifying and instructive, even to those who
are much in the dark as to their strictly prophetical meaning, and
before whose minds the question rarely comes whether they are
not as full of prophecy as they are of promise.

With these hints, which you can consider at your leisure, and
which I assure you will both bear and reward your prayerful
examination and meditation, I shall now take you, as the Lord
may enable, into the bosom of our text; and in so doing, I shall

I.—First, endeavour to trace out the character as described by

the prophet in the words before us; in which we find four marks
stamped upon him, which I shall examine one by one in the
following order: 1. He is written among the living in Jerusalem. 2.
He is one of "the escaped of Israel." He is "left in Zion and
remaineth in Jerusalem." 4. He shall be called "holy."

II.—My second point will be, to open, as far as I am enabled, who

this "Branch of the Lord" is, to show how and why he is "beautiful
and glorious," and what is "the fruit of the earth" which is
"excellent and comely for them that are escaped of Israel."

I.—You will perceive that the words of the text begin with an
expression, which is very common in the prophecies of the Old
Testament, "In that day." My time will not allow me to explain at
any length the meaning of the expression. I shall, therefore,
merely observe, that very great things are said of that day in the
prophetic Scriptures; that it embraces things of judgment and
things of mercy; is a day of great darkness (Amos 5:20), and a
day of great light (Isaiah 30:26); a day of tribulation and anguish
as the time of Jacob's trouble (Jer. 30:7), and a day of
deliverance, joy, and singing, as a day of manifested salvation.
(Isaiah 26:1.) But why should the Scriptures speak so much of
that day, and use such different language of the things which are
to be accomplished in it? Because with all this apparent
difference, if not discrepancy of meaning, there is a primary
leading idea which distinguishes this day from all other days. It is
the day of the Lord inasmuch as it is the day in which the Lord
displays his power. And thus, as he displays his power both in
judgment and mercy, both in condemnation and salvation, it is
his day, whether it be to pull down or build up, to kill or make
alive, to destroy or to save. But observe, also, that as it is "the
day of the Lord" with whom one day is as a thousand years, and
a thousand years as one day" (2 Peter 3:8), it cannot be
measured by time. Thus, whether that day be a day of twenty-
four hours, or a day of weeks, or a day of years; whether it be
the present day or a future day, that is the day of the Lord to
every man's soul in which the Lord works with any degree of
power. In fact, the whole of this present dispensation is but one
day, as the Apostle speaks: "Behold now is the accepted time,
now is the day of salvation" (2 Cor. 6:2); meaning, thereby, not
that there is to every man a day of grace which he may use or
abuse, as his free will may enable him, but that this whole time of
Christ's present intercession is the accepted time, the day of
salvation spoken of by the prophet. (Isaiah 49:8.) But in a
spiritual and experimental sense, to every saved soul there
comes a day, which is to him the day of the Lord, and to him a
day of days, inasmuch as the Lord signalises and distinguishes it
by the putting forth of his almighty power, whether it be to pull
down or build up, wound or heal, apply the law or bring home the
gospel. We shall see, by-and-by, as the Lord may lead us into our
subject, what is done in that day in a way of mercy and
deliverance. But I must first, as I proposed, trace out the
character of whom our text specially speaks as bearing stamped
upon him four distinct marks.

i. The first mark that I shall endeavour to unfold is, that he is

"written among the living in Jerusalem." If you will refer to the
margin, which generally gives the literal meaning of the original,
and is thus often more correct than the rendering found in the
text, you will see it is "to life." He is written unto life. In other
words, his name is written in the Lamb's book of life. To write his
name in the book of life, was the first act of grace conferred upon
him. Now it is a very solemn thought, and one which deeply
concerns every one in this congregation, that if our names are
not written in the book of life, we shall be cast into the lake of
fire, according to that solemn testimony in the Revelation, "And I
saw the dead, small and great, stand before God; and the books
were opened: and another book was opened, which is the book of
life; and the dead were judged out of those things which were
written in the books, according to their works." "And whosoever
was not found written in the book of life was cast into the lake of
fire." (Rev. 20:12, 15.) In the same book we have a description
given of a holy city, the new Jerusalem, and it is declared of it:
"And there shall in no wise enter into it any thing that defileth,
neither whatsoever worketh abomination, or maketh a lie: but
they which are written in the Lamb's book of life." (Rev. 21:27.)
Of what amazing consequence then it is to know whether our
names are written therein or not. You may wish to have some
intimation or indication that your name is in that book. Is there
any means of knowing it? Are its leaves so folded from all sight or
observation in this life, that we must wait for eternity to look into
it? If it may be known in this life, must an angel bring down the
book of life and open its leaves; or take us up to the third heaven
to look upon the writing? Paul, writing to the Philippians, speaks
of Clement and others his fellow labourers, whose names were in
the book of life. (Phil. 4:3.) It appears then Paul knew that not
only his own name, but that of Clement and others, were in that
book. But how can that be known? By such marks as are given in
our text, and especially by their being "written among the living
in Jerusalem."
If we adopt the literal interpretation of Jerusalem, as
prophetically the city of their local habitation, or view it spiritually
as representing the Jerusalem which is above and the mother of
us all (Gal. 4:26), it will not much affect this particular point,
which is, that "they are written among the living;" in other words,
are inscribed on the roll of those who possess the life of God in
their souls. Now this possession of divine and spiritual life flows
from that first act of grace of which I have spoken, as writing
their names in the book of life. Because they were chosen in
Christ before the foundation of the world, and life was given to
them in him, as their covenant Head, they are quickened into
divine life, each as and when the set time comes. In the book of
life their names were written from all eternity, before they had
birth or being, as our Lord beautifully speaks both of himself and
them in Psalm 139: "Thine eyes did see my substance, yet being
unperfect; and in thy book all my members were written, which
in continuance were fashioned, when as yet there were none of
them." (Ps. 139:16.) As the eyes of the Father saw the substance
of Christ's humanity, the body which he had prepared for him
(Heb. 10:5) whilst yet imperfect, that is, not yet assumed in the
womb of the Virgin, so the members of his mystical body were
written in God's book, the book of life, and "what days they
should be fashioned," (margin,) that is, brought into both natural
and spiritual existence, were all appointed, when as yet there was
none of them in actual being. And as according to the fore-
knowledge of God and his predestinating will, his dear Son in due
time assumed that humanity into union with his own divine
Person, thus fore-viewed, so are his mystical members quickened
into spiritual life, each at the appointed season. We see,
therefore, a connection between being "written to life," and being
"written among the living," according to the two meanings of the
words which I have given from the text and the margin, and that
from time to time the names of those who are in the book of life
are, as it were, copied out of it into the book of the living; this
being so to speak, the roll-call of the inhabitants of Jerusalem in
their time and state. This life, by which they thus live unto God, is
the express gift of Christ, according to his own words: "As thou
hast given him power over all flesh, that he should give eternal
life to as many as thou hast given him." (John 17:2.) Those,
then, whose names are in the book of life, being in Christ by an
eternal union, though dead in sin as the consequence of the
Adam-fall, were mystically quickened together with him when
God raised him from the dead, and are actually quickened when
in due time life is breathed into their dead souls, out of the
fulness of the Son of God. Then, and not till then, they may be
said to live, as is beautifully opened in Ezekiel 16 where, when
the infant is cast out in the open field to the loathing of its person
in the day it is born, the husband of the soul is represented as
passing by, and saying unto it, "Live." It was with him the time of
love, as he speaks: "Now when I passed by thee, and looked
upon thee, behold, thy time was the time of love; and I spread
my skirt over thee, and covered thy nakedness: yea, I sware
unto thee, and entered into a covenant with thee, saith the Lord
God, and thou becamest mine." (Ezek. 16:8.) It is this word of
the Lord, "Live," which communicates life, for it is by the power of
his word entering the heart through the animating breath of the
blessed spirit that the soul lives and stands, so to speak, on its
feet. (Ezek. 37:9, 10.) Until then our souls are quickened into
divine life by the power of the word, and the invincible energy of
the Holy Ghost, we know nothing of the movements, breathings,
actings, and exercises of those who are written among the living
in Jerusalem; and therefore, whatever our notions may be about
election, however fluent our tongue, or strong our confidence, we
have, at present, no scriptural evidence of our names being in the
hook of life. But when divine life enters the soul out of the fulness
of the Son of God, there comes together with it an indication, an
intimation, a testimony more or less clear, according to the
measure in which it is felt of our being possessed of this new and
heavenly life; for it is with the new-born soul as with the living
infant, distinguished from the still-born babe, that where there is
life there are movements of life; there is breathing, there is
crying, there is getting near the mother, there is drawing the milk
from her bosom, all which are proofs and indications of life in the
child born alive, as contrasted with the want of breath, life, and
movement in the babe that is dead. But I must not keep you
longer upon this point, as it is so plain and obvious; and as there
is so much other important matter in my text to lay before you.

ii. The second mark in the character traced out by the Holy Ghost
as distinctive of Him to whom the Branch of the Lord is beautiful
and glorious is, that he is one of "the escaped of Israel." This is
the point which I shall chiefly dwell upon, as his most important
and distinctive feature, touching upon the other two marks in his
character as subsidiary. He is said, then, to be one of the
"escaped of Israel."

Battles in ancient tunes were very sanguinary. They took no

prisoners and gave no quarter; and as men fought hand to hand,
foot to foot, and shoulder to shoulder, with sword and spear, with
little generalship and no such military maneouvres as are
practicable only with disciplined troops, they being only raw
levies, battles in those days were attended with very great
bloodshed; and, speaking comparatively, very few escaped from
the field of battle. There were so few indeed who escaped unhurt
from the field of a well contested battle, that there is a particular
word for them in the Hebrew language; and it is here made use
of, being well rendered in our admirable translation, "the
escaped." You may see then how few really escaped death on the
field of battle, when a certain name was attached to them as
designating the happy few who came off alive, when their fellows
in arms fell in the general slaughter. As if, then, to show how few
they are who, as saved from the general overthrow of mankind,
are written among the living in Jerusalem, the Holy Ghost has
used that peculiar word, and designated them here "the escaped
of Israel," as if there were as few spiritually who escaped out of
the general wreck and sweeping destruction of the fall as there
were few that escaped out of those bloody battles of old.

Let me now then direct your attention particularly to the word

"escaped," as I have explained it; and taking the idea of a
sanguinary battle, or some general and signal overthrow, as of
Sodom, for the original word is used of both, let us see what
those who are written among the living in Jerusalem do not
escape and what they do escape; as by viewing their history and
experience under these two distinct aspects, we may gather up,
with God's help and blessing, a clearer idea of what grace has
rescued them from, supported them under, and delivered them
out of. When a sailor escapes shipwreck, when a soldier escapes
with his life from the field of battle, when in a city taken by storm
a few escape the edge of the sword, it is evident that they all
have passed through dangers and perils which threatened them
with destruction, and from which they have been miraculously
rescued. Thus it is with "the escaped of Israel." In escaping with
life, they do not escape the things which threaten life, or bring
with them danger and sorrow.

1. They do not then escape the troubles, sorrows, and afflictions

of this life. Nay, they have rather a larger share of them than
others. God's people, besides their spiritual troubles, which are
peculiar to the elect of God, have usually a larger share of worldly
sorrows than those who have their portion in this life. And,
indeed, it seems almost indispensable for their safe walking and
their happily reaching the heavenly shore, that they should be
well weighted, well ballasted, and well afflicted, that they might
instrumentally be preserved from the love and spirit of the world,
and those innumerable evils which drown them in destruction and
perdition. You complain sometimes of your temporal troubles;
how bitter is your daily cup; how you seem even naturally to
have heavier afflictions than your neighbours. But how very
rarely are you led to see the benefits and blessings couched in
them. You murmur, you fret, you rebel, you think yourself very
hardly dealt with on account of these continued afflictions. But
are there not moments with you, though perhaps rare, when you
can bless God for laying upon you his heavy hand as regards the
body, or the family, or circumstances, as well as bringing upon
you tribulation of soul? Do you not find a benefit couched in all
these painful afflictions, and do they not produce in you, through
divine grace, a weaning of spirit, a separation from the world, a
sense that this is not your rest nor home? Have you not found
your soul more lively, your conscience more tender, your heart
more drawn up in faith and love when you have been pressed
down by trouble and sorrow, and had more real access unto, and
communion with, the Lord of life and glory? Many times is the
soul brought near unto the Lord by the weight of temporal
afflictions, as feeling that none but he can support it under them.

2. Nor do they escape the scorn of men, the scourge of the

tongue, the arrow of slander, the back-blow of calumny, the
opposition of sinners, and sometimes also that of saints. If they
did, they could have neither their Master's portion, nor their
Master's blessing. "Blessed are ye, when men shall revile you,
and persecute you, and shall say all manner of evil against you
falsely, for my sake." (Matt. 5:11.)

3. Nor do they escape the snares of Satan ever spread to

entangle their feet, or his fiery darts shot into their soul, or the
continual means used by him to draw them from the strait and
narrow path into the broad road. If he tempted the Head he will
tempt the members; but the promise is, "The God of peace shall
bruise Satan under your feet shortly." (Rom. 16:20.) And again,
"Fear none of those things which thou shalt suffer: behold, the
devil shall cast some of you into prison, that ye may be tried; and
ye shall have tribulation ten days: be thou faithful unto death,
and I will give thee a crown of life."

4. Nor do they escape the workings of unbelief; of doubt and

fear, of guilt and bondage, of inward condemnation and shame,
nor all those exercises which are a part of our experience by the
way, and which God overrules in a wonderful way for our soul's
good. In fact, there is scarcely a sin, or a temptation, or a peril,
or a snare which takes captive and drowns men in destruction
and perdition which they have not a taste, a sight, or a sense of
enough to make them see and sometimes tremblingly feel that
grace, and grace alone, can either keep them from it, forgive
them for it, or deliver them out of it.

iii. But what are the ills and evils which they do escape?

1. First, they escape the wrath of God that burns as a consuming

fire. Here they resemble Noah, who escaped the deluge by "being
warned of God of things not seen as yet, moved with fear,
prepared an ark to the saving of his house." (Heb. 11:7.) How
small a remnant escaped in that day when as Peter speaks: "Few,
that is, eight souls, were saved by water." (1 Pet. 3:20.) They
resemble also Lot, who escaped out of Sodom when that city was
burnt with fire and brimstone from heaven; and the early
Christians of whom we read in Church history, that warned by the
Lord's words, "Then let them which be in Judea flee into the
mountains," they fled out of the city at the last siege of
Jerusalem, and thus escaped the sword of the Romans.

But what makes them escape the wrath of God? A sense of the
wrath of God being let down into their consciences. No man
escapes the wrath of God who does not flee from the wrath of
God. No one escaped the deluge but by being warned of the
deluge. Lot escaped the flames of Sodom by being warned of the
judgment of God upon Sodom. So the escaped of Israel escape
the wrath of God by being warned in their consciences of what
that wrath is, by having some drops of it let down into their souls,
whereby they see what an God is an a [???] broken law, and
how his vengeance will burn to the uttermost against every
sinner whom he finds out of Christ at the great and awful day.

2. Again, they escape the lot of the Pharisee. There is nothing

more dangerous than a proud, self-righteous, pharisaical spirit,
for nothing sets us farther from the promises and blessings of the
gospel. But this spirit they escape by having deep discoveries of
the evils of their heart, so that they cannot boast of self, but feel
all their righteousness to be as filthy rags, and that so far as they
stand in self out of, and apart from Christ, they stand before God
in all their nakedness, guilt, and shame. When deeply exercised
with in-dwelling sin, they do not often see any benefit arising out
of it; and yet by these discoveries and exercises they
instrumentally escape the pride and self-righteousness of the
Pharisee and perishing with a false hope.

3. Again, they escape the vain confidence and presumptuous

assurance of the wretched antinomian, who trusts to and hangs
upon dead, dry, and naked doctrine, without knowing anything of
the sweetness of experimental truth in his soul. No living soul, no
tried, tempted, distressed and exercised child of God, can trust to
cold, naked doctrine. This does not arise from want of faith or
knowledge, want of searching the Scriptures, bowing the knee in
secret, or frequenting the house of prayer, for in all these things
they are both diligent and earnest. They believe all the doctrines
of the gospel as firmly as those who make all their boast in them;
they receive them as precious truths; and there are times and
seasons when they feel the sweetness and power of them in their
heart. But they must be to them something more than doctrines
to do their souls any real good. They must know something more
of election than seeing it revealed in the first chapter of the
Ephesians, something more of predestination than reading of it in
Romans 8, and something more of redemption by the blood of
Christ, than by reading of it in Revelation 5, as a part of the new
song. They must know the application of these things with power
to their souls; and they see and feel too, that these truths of the
gospel are not mere doctrines to fill the head, but precious truths
of God to comfort and encourage the heart.

4. They escape also the love and spirit of the world, with the love
of riches which is the root of all evil, and tempting and
encouraging many a fair and once promising professor to put
away a good conscience, often leads him concerning faith to
make shipwreck. It is a solemn thought that so few escape with
their life; and well may we cry aloud to all who seem anxious
about their souls as the angels said to Lot, "Escape for thy life;
look not behind thee, neither stay thou in all the plain; escape to
the mountain, lest thou be consumed." (Gen. 19:17.) The
universal testimony of the word of God is to the fewness of the
saved, compared with the number of the lost; and this should
make every one who is concerned about his immortal soul beg of
the Lord that he may have some clear testimony that he is
amongst those happy few.

iv. But what is the effect of this escaping for life? That he is one
of those who are "left in Zion" and "remain in Jerusalem."
God's people are, if I may use the expression, a circle within a
circle: they are a people taken out of a people. Thus, not to
mention the vast crowd of the openly profane, there is the wide
circle of the professing generation—that is the outer circle; and
then within this there is the inner circle of God's living family. It is
true of them, as the apostle speaks, "They are not all Israel which
are of Israel: neither because they are the seed of Abraham are
they all children," (Rom. 9:6, 7,) for there is an Israel after the
flesh and an Israel after the spirit; and it is to the latter that the
people of God belong. They are therefore called "a remnant
according to the election of grace." (Rom. 11:5.) The apostle, to
show this, cites the testimony of Isaiah: "Esaias also crieth
concerning Israel, though the number of the children of Israel be
as the sand of the sea, a remnant shall be saved," (Rom. 9:27,)
that is a remnant only out of a number as the sand on the sea-
shore. Those, therefore, who are "written among the living in
Jerusalem" and are "the escaped of Israel," are spoken of here as
"left in Zion" when all the rest have been swept away into
destruction. They are elsewhere compared to gleaning grapes
when the vintage is done, and to two or three olive berries left in
the top of the tree after the whole of the crop has been gathered:
"Yet gleaning grapes shall be left in it, as the shaking of an olive
tree, two or three berries in the top of the uppermost bough, four
or five in the outmost fruitful branches thereof, saith the Lord
God of Israel." (Isa. 17:6.) Let us not think, then, that saving
religion is such an easy matter, and that multitudes are going to
heaven, but rather seek to have some clear evidence in our own
bosom that we are among the escaped of Israel and the left in
Zion.

2. And they "remain in Jerusalem." Others fall into error: they

escape it by that anointing which teacheth them of all things and
is truth and no lie, and abide by truth because they know it by
divine teaching and divine testimony, and because it has made
them free. Others fall into open sin and disgrace the cause; these
are kept more or less by the power of God, for the promise is,
that sin shall not have dominion over them. Others who once
promised well sooner or later are overcome by the love of the
world, fall back into it, or if they keep up their outward
profession, have but a name to live when they are dead. But
these remain in Jerusalem, the city of the living God, because
they "are written amongst the living in Jerusalem." There is a
Jerusalem above, the mother of us all, and to that new Jerusalem
they belong. They are the sons and daughters who suck at her
breasts; she nurtured them and cherished them in their infancy
and youth, and they abide by her in their old age. It is true that a
child of God who has tasted and felt the power of truth in his own
soul, had the love of God shed abroad in his heart, and felt a
spirit of love to the Lord's people as seeing in them the image of
Christ, may be often sadly tried and tempted to give all up, may
sink at times almost into despair as regards his own state and
standing, and similarly may, by various circumstances that may
arise, be strongly tempted to withdraw from the people of God.
But "No," he says: "I can never give up truth, nor cast away my
hope, nor leave the family of God. For what would become of me
if I were to do any of these things? I must be a poor, wandering
outcast, going here and there without home, companion, or
friend, till I drop down and die. I must keep to God's truth; for
nothing else can save my soul; nothing else speak liberty to my
heart. I must abide also by God's people: they are sometimes
very rough and rugged, and often very hard and fractious to deal
with: and many a sleepless night or anxious day have I passed
from some of their cruel wounds. But I cannot give them up, for
after all they are the excellent of the earth in whom is all my
delight." May I not speak freely on this point both from my own
experience and from what I have seen and witnessed in other
churches, that many a member of a Church and many a pastor
has had more trouble arising from Church matters, and the
fractious, inconsistent, peevish, obstinate, and determined party
spirit of members, than from any other source of trouble, except
his own personal salvation? Yet with all that in them which is so
trying, we cannot give the people of God up. Shall we leave the
Church of God, renounce all further intercourse or connection
with his dear family, and go back into the world which we profess
to have left, abandon truth, and embrace error? Do we not
almost shudder at the very thought of all this as if it would be
rank apostasy? And do we not feel that by so doing we should be
sealing our own condemnation both for time and eternity?
Whatever, therefore, be the consequences, whatever be the
trials, the exercises, the difficulties connected with the cause and
service of God, stand fast and hard by God's truth, by God's
people, God's servants, God's house, God's ways, and God's
word, and you will find in the end the benefit of it.

They are said to be "holy," because the various things through

which they pass have a sanctified effect upon their hearts, lips,
and lives. If God work with a divine power in the heart of his
people, it is to make them be something different from what they
were before, to sanctify them for his own honour and glory, and
to do something in them and for them, that shall be to his praise.
It is very contradictory to the whole character of God, as revealed
in the word of his grace, that you should go through seas of
trouble, have wave after wave and billow after billow of affliction,
go into trial after trial and temptation after temptation, and then,
like Solomon's fool, who is "brayed in a mortar among wheat with
a pestle," come out as you went in, your foolishness not departed
from you—it may be with a broken head and a bruised body, but
not a broken heart or a contrite spirit. God chastises his people to
make them partakers of his holiness. He does not send afflictions,
trials, and chastisements upon them to do nothing for them or in
them beyond a few sighs and groans. If, then, the various trials
that you speak so much about, the heavy afflictions that you
seem so exercised with, and the temptations which so often press
you sore, leave you just as they found you, with no sanctifying,
no humbling, no softening, or subduing effect upon your spirit, it
seems almost as if you were in the mortar with the fool; and that
all the pounding with the pestle, and all the bruising in body or
mind, in family or in circumstances, in pride or pocket, in self or
in your second self, only left you just where it found you, no
nearer the kingdom of heaven, no more conformed in your spirit
to the image of Christ, no more separate from the world and the
spirit of it, and made no more manifestly meet for the inheritance
of the saints in light.
II.—But having thus far traced out the character spoken of in our
text as bearing stamped upon him, by the hand of God, the four
distinctive marks which I have described, I shall now show who is
"the Branch of the Lord" that is "beautiful and glorious," and what
is the "fruit of the earth" which is "excellent and comely for them
that are escaped of Israel."

i. By "the Branch of the Lord" we must understand our Lord Jesus

Christ; for this is the word which the Holy Ghost has expressly
made use of to indicate him: "And there shall come forth a rod
out of the stem of Jesse, and a Branch shall grow out of his
roots." (Isa. 11:1.) "Behold the man whose name is THE
BRANCH. He shall grow up out of his place, and he shall build the
temple of the Lord." (Zech. 6:12.) "Behold I will bring forth my
servant, THE BRANCH." (Zech. 3:8.) By the word Branch, then,
as thus applied to our Lord, we may primarily understand the
human nature of Christ; for the Branch was to come out of the
stem of Jesse, and our Lord "was made of the seed of David
according to the flesh." (Rom. 1:3.) But if we look at a
remarkable passage in Jeremiah, we shall see that this title, the
Branch of the Lord, comprehends both his divine and human
nature; for these really never can be separated. The humanity of
Christ never existed separate from his deity; for it was united to
his Divine nature in the moment of conception. "Behold, the days
come, saith the Lord, that I will raise unto David a righteous
Branch;" and then it goes on, "This is his name whereby he shall
be called, the LORD our righteousness." Thus we have the Divine
nature, as intimated by the word "the LORD," that is Jehovah,
and the humanity as indicated by the expression "our
righteousness." Thus we may take "the Branch of the Lord" to
signify our blessed Lord in his complex Person as God and man in
one glorious Christ.

This Branch of the Lord is "beautiful and glorious to them that are
escaped of Israel." But what makes him "beautiful?" His being so
suitable. I have shown you from the text that those to whom the
Branch of the Lord is beautiful and glorious are the escaped of
Israel; and I have pointed out that they are such as have known
something of the anger of God in a broken law, the condemnation
of a guilty conscience, the taunting accusations of Satan, and
their need of a better righteousness than flesh can work out. As,
then, the Branch of the Lord, the Son of God and the Son of man,
in his complex Person, is brought before them, revealed in them,
and discovered unto them, in his Deity, in his humanity, in the
efficacy of his atoning blood, and in the glory of his justifying
righteousness, he becomes "beautiful" to them. They see a
beauty in the Son of God altogether inexpressible. Where in
heaven or on earth can there be found such a lovely Object as
the Son of God? View him in his divine Sonship and eternal
Deity—what beauty there is in him as thus revealed to faith. How
beautiful to see all the wisdom of God, which we stand so deeply
in need of to guide and direct our path; all the love of God, for
God is love, to attract, charm, and bless; all the mercy of God, so
suitable to poor lost sinners; all the grace of God, that saves
without worth or worthiness; all the pity and compassion of God,
that moved him to think upon, to pardon, and to bless poor guilty
man;—to see all this glory of God shining forth in the face and
Person of Jesus Christ, brought nigh to us in Immanuel, God with
us, God in our nature, how beautiful is he as thus revealed and
seen. The attributes of the divine nature are thus not viewed at a
distance, as dimly and darkly seen in a holy God; not looked upon
as the children of Israel looked at Mount Sinai, amidst flames of
fire and thunder and lightning, the sound of a trumpet and voice
of words; but looked at in the meek and mild majesty of God's
dear Son. Thus as we can look at the natural sun when it is
shielded by a cloud or descending in its evening radiance, when
we cannot bear to view its bright beams in the meridian day; so
we can look at God in Christ, and so all the grace and glory,
power and wisdom, love and mercy of God shining forth in his
dear Son. As such, is he not a beautiful Object for faith to view,
hope to anchor in, and love to embrace and enjoy? "What is thy
beloved more than another beloved?" asked the companions of
the Bride. But she answers, "My beloved is white and ruddy, the
chiefest among ten thousand." If, then, you never have seen any
beauty in Jesus, you have never seen Jesus; he has never
revealed himself to you; you never had a glimpse of his lovely
face, nor a sense of his presence, nor a word from his lips, nor a
touch from his hand. But if you have seen him by the eye of faith,
and he has revealed himself to you even in a small measure, you
have seen a beauty in him beyond all other beauties, for it is a
holy beauty, a divine beauty, the beauty of his heavenly grace,
the beauty of his uncreated and eternal glory, such as no earthly
countenance can wear, nor man or woman, no, not Adam, in all
his unfallen innocency, nor his fair partner Eve, with all her
virtue, grace, and dignity, ever could show, for it is the beauty of
the glorious Son of God, which he for ever wears as the Son of
the Father in truth and love.

ii. And as he is "beautiful," so is he "glorious." O what a glory

does faith see sometimes in his eternal Deity, in his divine
Sonship, in what he is in himself as the brightness of the Father's
glory and the express image of his Person, and in what he is as
made unto us wisdom and righteousness, sanctification and
redemption. How glorious does he show himself to be in his
atoning blood and dying love. Even as sweating great drops of
blood in Gethsemane's gloomy garden, and as hanging in torture
and agony upon Calvary's cross, faith can see a beauty in the
glorious Redeemer, even in the lowest depths of ignominy and
shame. Was there not a glory in his meek obedience, in his
suffering patience, in his submission to his Father's holy will, in
his uncomplaining resignation to the heaviest strokes of vindictive
justice, in bearing our sins in his own body on the tree, and thus
putting away sin by the sacrifice of himself? But more especially
does faith see him glorious, as rising from the dead and going up
on high, and sitting down at the right hand of the Father,
crowned with glory and honour, and all things put under his feet.

iii. But "the fruit of the earth," it is added, "shall be excellent and
comely for them that are the escaped of Israel."
By the "fruit of the earth" we may understand that gracious and
holy fruit which grew upon the Branch: and it seems to be called
"the fruit of the earth," because it appeared on earth when our
Lord was there. Thus not only all his words, works, and ways, all
the parables, doctrines, precepts, and promises uttered by the
mouth of the Son of God in the days of his flesh, but all the
benefits and blessings that spring in the way of redemption out of
his complex Person, and grow as it were, a holy fruit out of him
as the Branch, such as his atoning blood, his glorious
righteousness, his dying love, his resurrection and ascension, and
his power to save to the uttermost all that come unto God by
him, may all be considered as "the fruit of the earth," because
wrought by him in and upon the earth, and done in the days of
his flesh when his gracious feet were upon this earthly ball.

This fruit is "excellent" to the escaped of Israel. There is seen in it

to be a divine excellency. Therefore, there is not a shadow of a
fault to be found with it. It is perfect in all its parts; complete to
the very centre, and therefore seen to be excellent, as so
glorifying to God, and so adapted to every want and woe of those
that are left in Zion and remain in Jerusalem.

And "comely" too. In his sufferings, in his bloodshedding,

obedience, holy life, and expiatory death, there is a surpassing
comeliness, because in them shine forth a divine glory and a
heavenly beauty. It is indeed the same word as is translated
"beauty" in the holy garments made for Aaron by Moses (Exod.
28:2), and clothed in which he ministered before the Lord when
he went into the holy place. So our great High Priest now
ministers within the veil in the holiness and beauty of his glorified
humanity; and as this is seen and apprehended by faith, the
Church sings, "I sat under his shadow with great delight, and his
fruit was sweet to my taste." "His glory is great in thy salvation:
honour and majesty hast thou laid upon him." (Song 2:3; Psa.
21:5.)

May I not appeal to your conscience if these heavenly blessings

have not a sanctifying effect and influence on the heart? Such at
least is the mind of God in making them known to the escaped of
Israel; and does he not make the Branch of the Lord beautiful
and glorious, and the fruit of the earth excellent and comely to
those that are left in Zion and remain in Jerusalem, that they
may be a holy people, and thus manifest by their godly life and
walk that they are written among the living in Jerusalem, and are
thus distinguished from the dead in sin, and the dead in a
profession?
THE BREAKER

Preached at Providence Chapel, Oakham, on Tuesday Evening,

May 12, 1846

"The breaker is come up before them: they have broken up, and
have passed through the gate, and are gone out by it: and their
king shall pass before them, and the Lord on the head of them."
Micah 2:13

I should not do justice to my conviction of the meaning of the Old

Testament Scriptures if I did not state that I believe this passage
has a prophetical as well as an experimental meaning. Let us give
a glance at the context. We read in the preceding verse, "I will
surely assemble, O Jacob, all of thee; I will surely gather the
remnant of Israel; I will put them together as the sheep of
Bozrah, as the flock in the midst of their fold; they shall make
great noise by reason of the multitude of men. The breaker is
come up before them." Now as to the prophetical meaning of this
Scripture, it appears to my mind to point to a day not yet arrived,
to "the latter day" of which the Old Testament prophets speak so
much. When the Lord shall set his hand a second time to gather
the remnant spread abroad on the earth, then this prophecy of
Micah will be literally fulfilled: for there will be those difficulties in
the way which none but "the Breaker" going before can remove.
But the Scriptures are written with that mysterious wisdom that
there is not only in the Old Testament prophecies what is strictly
prophetical, but also experimental. We are not to discard the
prophetical meaning as some do, for God has given it, and every
word of God is pure. But on the other hand, it is the spiritual and
experimental part which is food for the church of God. Therefore
though we dare not pass by the literal meaning, yet we confine
our attention chiefly to the spiritual. And in this way, with God's
blessing, I shall view it this evening, taking the words much in
the order as they now lie before me.

"The breaker is come up before them: they have broken up, and
have passed through the gate, and are gone out by it: and their
king shall pass before them, and the Lord on the head of them."

There are two main things here:

First. The people of whom these things are said.

Secondly. That wondrous Individual who is here pointed out by

the expression, "The breaker."

I. The people here spoken of are the people of God, the remnant
according to the election of grace, God's own beloved family. But
we gather from the words used that they had great difficulties,
for why need they to have a breaker go before them unless they
were in such difficulties as nothing but an almighty hand could
break down and remove? Thus we gather that the people to
whom this promise is made are in such straits and difficulties,
that they can never succeed in making a passage for themselves:
but that this wondrous Person, this Immanuel, God with us, is to
go before them; and for that reason he is called "the breaker,"
because with his almighty hand he breaks up and breaks down
these difficulties that lie in their path, and which they themselves
could not by any wisdom or strength of their own remove out of
the way.

Let us look at this a little more closely, and open it a little more in
detail. When the Lord is first pleased to quicken a soul dead in
sin, he sets before him the narrow gate; he shews him that his
sins merit eternal wrath and punishment, and he raises up in his
heart a desire to flee from the wrath to come. However the
circumstances of the new birth may vary, there will always be
this leading feature accompanying the work of the Spirit in the
heart—a fleeing from the wrath to come; a cry in the soul, "What
shall I do to be saved? God be merciful to me a sinner." As
Bunyan sweetly sets forth in the Pilgrim's Progress, a quickened
soul, like Christian, immediately begins to run. All the difficulties
that encompass him are nothing compared to the burden on his
back. Wife, child, family, money, all are considered less than
nothing compared with the salvation of his soul. Therefore he
begins to run, setting his face Zionward, earnestly desiring to be
found saved at last with an everlasting salvation.

But no sooner does he begin to run, and move onward in the

heavenly way than he begins to find difficulties. The way to
heaven is described as "a path which no fowl knoweth, and which
the vulture's eye hath not seen" (Job 28:7) . "Strait is the gate,
and narrow is the way, which leadeth unto life, and few there be
that find it." (Matt. 7:14). We must "through much tribulation
enter into the kingdom of God." The Lord, therefore, knowing the
difficulties of the way, on one occasion, when he saw great
multitudes following him, turned and said to them, "If any man
come to me, and hate not his father, and mother, and wife, and
children, and brethren, and sisters, yea, and his own life also, he
cannot be my disciple. And whosoever doth not bear his cross,
and come after me, cannot be my disciple" (Luke 14:26, 27). As
though he would check this rash forwardness by shewing them
that no one could run in that way except he denied himself and
took up his cross; implying that the way to heaven is one of
continual self-denial, a path of daily crucifixion. And what is the
object of this? It is to teach a soul this great lesson—that he
cannot by any wisdom, any strength, any righteousness, or any
goodness of his own obtain eternal life. We are very slow learners
in this school. The pride of our heart, our ignorance, and our
unbelief, all conspire to make us diminish the difficulties of the
way. But the Lord has to teach us by painful experience that the
road to heaven is so difficult that a man can only walk in it as he
is put in and kept in it by an almighty hand.

When these difficulties first begin to rise, they startle him that is
first running in Zion's way. For instance, the discovery of a
broken law, and of the curse that flames from Mount Sinai is an
obstacle insuperable in the way to glory; for if a sinner has to get
to glory by the burning mount, he must be consumed as he
passes over it, for from that mount nothing but wrath comes.
Again, he is startled by the discovery of the corruptions of his
heart, the workings of that inward iniquity, which before was
hidden from him. He now becomes aware of secret sins that
before he was utterly unacquainted with. He becomes aware too
that there is such a thing as living faith, and that without faith it
is impossible to please God; and he finds he has not this living
faith, and is unable to raise it up in his own heart. He finds love
also spoken of; and he finds he cannot by any power of his own
raise up this love to God or to his people. He finds hope too
spoken of; and he is sinking in the waves of despondency. He
finds prayer spoken of; and he feels utterly unable to pour out
his heart before God. He finds submission to God's will spoken
of; and he perhaps feels little else but repining and hard thoughts
of God. He finds an inward knowledge of Jesus spoken of, and
the revelation of Christ to the soul; and he finds darkness and
gloom within. He cannot bring this knowledge of Christ into the
heart. A man may have all the religion of the world in his head, in
the theory, and never meet with one difficulty. But if once he is
put into the strait way by the hand of God, he will meet with
difficulties; nay, he will feel the whole scene to be more or less a
scene of difficulties. Now this prepares a man for the knowledge
of "the breaker." "The breaker," we read in the text, "is gone up
before them." But what use is the breaker if there be nothing to
break down? no obstacles in the way? no rocks or stones in the
road, all a smooth, grassy meadow with nothing to obstruct the
course? The very circumstances of a breaker being wanted
implies there are such difficulties in the way as nothing but an
almighty hand can break down. There was a custom in primitive
times which throws a still further light on the text. In those times
there were no great highways as there are now. When kings
wanted to go out on an expedition, men went before them to
clear the way, to fill up the hollows, and dig down the mountains
in order to make a path for the king. So this divine breaker has to
go before, and as he goes before he breaks down those
difficulties and obstacles that lie in the path.

II. But who is this breaker? Need I say it is the Lord of life and
glory; Immanuel, God with us? Why is he called a breaker? This
is one of his titles. But why is this title given him? Because he
breaks down those obstacles that lie in the road. For you will
observe if you read the text, it speaks of a people coming up, and
passing through the gate, and journeying onward, and the king
passing before them, and the LORD, that is Jehovah, being at the
head of them. And you will observe also that this breaker is
Jehovah: for it is the LORD in capital letters, which always implies
Jehovah. The LORD that is Jehovah "is at the head of them,"
implying that the breaker is Jehovah, and he is called a breaker
because he breaks down the difficulties that lie in the path. For
instance, there is the law; and how are we to get by that
obstacle? Bunyan represents this in that invaluable work, the
Pilgrim's Progress. When Christian was drawn aside from the path
through the persuasion of Mr. Legality, and was going to the city
pointed out to him, he saw a mountain that overhung the road,
and thunder and lightning flashed from it, and he was afraid it
would fall on his head. There Bunyan shews that there will be
these flashes of God's wrath from the law, and the mountain will
appear as if it would fall upon him, so that he dare not go by that
road. But the breaker has travelled that way; he endured the
curse of the law for us. He so to speak broke down its curse
against God's people. As the Scripture speaks: "He took it out of
the way, nailing it to his cross;" and thus he so removed it that it
should not be a covenant of condemnation to his dear family. In
this sense he is a breaker. But not only is the law against them,
but also God's holiness, majesty, justice and purity, what
God is as an eternal Jehovah—all these things have to be
removed out of the way. But when Jesus died upon the cross, he
satisfied justice, and all the claims of God's holy law. By suffering
himself he made such a propitiation for sin as God the Father
could accept.

But besides these external difficulties that lie in the road there
are internal difficulties. The Lord's people find internal difficulties
as great and heavy to grapple with as external difficulties. For
instance, there is an unbelieving heart; and what a difficulty an
unbelieving heart is! If you are one that is journeying Zionward,
do you not know experimentally the workings of unbelief? And is
not this sometimes the sincere cry of your soul?
O could I but believe,
Then all would easy be;
I would, but cannot; Lord, relieve,
My help must come from thee.

Do you not find the workings of unbelief in your carnal mind? that
you cannot raise up living faith in your own heart, and yet you
are persuaded you must have living faith, or you can never
please God? Now this glorious breaker, this Immanuel, God with
us, breaks down this evil heart of unbelief by communicating
precious faith; and when he communicates precious faith, this
evil heart of unbelief is broken down. Unbelief does not then rule
and reign, it gives way to a better principle, for the elder is to
serve the younger.

But there is also a hard heart. And how the Lord's people have
to lament and mourn continually on account of their hard heart;
that they cannot feel as they would; soft, and contrite, and
broken; that they cannot see and feel sin as they would see and
feel it; that they cannot mourn nor sigh on account of the
iniquities that work in them; that they cannot look to a crucified
Saviour, and mourn over him, and grieve and groan because his
holy soul and body were so afflicted for sin. "The heart of stone,"
as the Scripture speaks, is in them, and nothing but the power of
God can take it away; for this is God's promise, "I will take away
the stony heart out of your flesh, and I will give you a heart of
flesh" (Ezek. 36:26), implying that there is a heart of stone, and
implying that nothing but the hand of God can take it away. Now
the breaker, when he comes up before the people of God, breaks
this hard heart; he melts it, and softens it, dissolves it, and
humbles it, and lays it low in holy admiration and adoration of
this blessed Immanuel. And thus he breaks the heart by breaking
into the heart, and breaks the soul by a sense of his dying love
and atoning blood, and this breaks it all to pieces, so that it
crumbles into nothing at his feet. And thus contrition, sorrow, and
grief blend together with faith, hope, and love. In this sense,
then, "the breaker is come up before them." Because when he
breaks their hard hearts he goes before them and leads them in
the ways of truth and righteousness.

But as they journey onward they find arising immeasurable

difficulties. What the Scripture calls, "gates of brass and bars
of iron." And there is a promise made to spiritual Israel, "I will
go before thee, and make the crooked places straight; I will
break in pieces the gates of brass, and cut in sunder the bars of
iron" (Isa. 45:2), implying that there are these difficulties which
the Scripture compares to brazen gates and iron bars in the way
of a believer. These are so great that the believer cannot break
them himself. He needs the breaker to go before him; and when
the breaker has come up before him, he has but to touch them,
and the way is made plain. As when Peter was in prison, and the
angel came to set him free, the gate opened of its own accord.
The angel had but to look, and the iron gate opened. But what is
the power of an angel, though angels are said in Scripture to
"excel in strength" (Ps. 103:20), compared with the power of God
himself? His power is incomprehensible. Words would fail to
speak of the distance betwixt the power of the brightest seraph or
the highest angel and the power of Jehovah. In a similar way,
then, as the gate opened of its own accord when the angel looked
or spoke, whatever the gates of brass and bars of iron a child of
God feels in his own experience to be obstacles that obstruct his
path, when the breaker is come up before them, he breaks them
asunder and takes them out of the way. Thus there are
temptations, and these are gates of brass and bars of iron;
there are trials, and there is the very nature of brass and iron in
them; and there are afflictions and difficulties, all the evils of
an evil heart, God hiding himself, not giving an answer to
their sighs and groans. The weary soul finds, through the
difficulties of the way, that all these are insuperable obstacles.
But the breaker goes up before them: and as he moves onward
and goes before the soul, all these difficulties vanish. The good
Shepherd goes before his sheep, and they follow him, for they
know his voice. And so the breaker is here represented, not as
following, but as going before; not waiting for his people to
accept offered grace, nor waiting for them to close in with the
invitation, but as going before them, and they following in the
path that he precedes them in.

III. And this leads me to consider what is contained in the next

portion of the text. "They have broken up, and have passed
through the gate, and are gone out by it." They have broken up.
Now the word 'broken up' here means that they have left the
camp where they were stationed. It is a common expression.
Boys are said to break up when they go home from school, that
is, a leaving the place where they are, and going home. So
spiritually, a breaking up here does not mean a breaking up of
the soul, but it means that they move onward from the spot in
which they were standing. "And they pass through the gate, and
go out by it," which implies that until the breaker goes before
them, they are stationary. It is with the children of God spiritually
as it was with tile children of Israel. There is a sweet description
in the book of Numbers of the children of Israel moving as they
saw the pillar of the cloud move, and resting as the pillar of the
cloud by day and of fire by night rested on the tabernacle. When
it was taken up, they moved forward: and when it stood still,
they stopped; where it abode, they rested: implying that the
spiritual Israel can only move forward as the Lord goes before
them. But directly the pillar of the cloud was taken up, they
journeyed forward: but there was no stirring until that took place.
So it is with the spiritual Israel. They cannot move forward until
they see the pillar of the cloud move; until the Lord goes before
them, they cannot stir. There they are; some full of darkness,
others full of doubts and fears; others, exercised with a heart full
of unbelief; others, conflicting with powerful temptations; others,
well-nigh swallowed up in despair, but all feeling themselves
unable to move forward. This marks the true Israel. We read in
the book of Job of those who "run upon the thick bosses of God's
bucklers" (Job 15:26). These are different characters from those
who wait at the footstool of God. "Your strength is to sit still"
(Isa. 30:7). So with the children of Israel when they were at the
Red Sea; they did not rush through the waters, but they waited
till God appeared; and when God appeared and Moses struck the
waters with his rod, and the channel was opened, then they
passed through. Thus it is spiritually: there is no moving except
as the Lord goes before the soul; and immediately that the
breaker is come up and goes before, the soul goes on; when he
stops, it stops; and when he moves, it moves. And then what
takes place? "They pass through the gate." Here is this gate that
has before stood closed against them, and they were unable to
pass through; but when the breaker goes before them, then the
gate is opened, and they pass through the gate just as the
breaker precedes. And is not this sweetly typical and descriptive
of the way in which the Lord's people move forward? This gate is
not only, perhaps not chiefly, the strait and narrow gate that
leads to eternal life. There are other gates besides that; for we
read, "Open ye the gates, that the righteous nation which
keepeth the truth may enter in." And thus the gate here spoken
of is not only, perhaps not chiefly, the strait and narrow gate, but
it is also any of those difficulties that lie in the path which may be
compared to a closed gate. But when the breaker goes up before
them, he opens the gate. We read that the Lord will open "a door
of hope in the valley of Achor," that is, he opens the gate, and
when he opens it they pass through. But what is the meaning of
"passing through the gate," viewed spiritually'? When the Lord,
for instance, does not appear to the soul, then the gate is closed;
there is no going up of faith to the Lord, and there is no answer
from him; there is no view of his glory such as Jacob had in
Bethel when he said, "This is none other but the house of God,
and this is the gate of heaven" (Gen. 28:17). What made him see
that this was the gate of heaven? Because in his dream, when he
had chosen stones for his pillow, he saw a ladder, and angels
ascending and descending it; and he looked up and saw where
the ladder was fixed. Then he saw heaven opened. This too, was
what Stephen saw when the enraged populace ran upon him and
stoned him to death. He said, "Behold, I see the heavens opened,
and the Son of man standing on the right hand of God" (Acts
7:56). There was a view in his soul of heaven and the glory and
blessedness of it. As his eyes looked up, he saw it, and his heart's
affections flowed out to it. So with God's people; this gate is often
closed; they cannot look up, or if they do, they cannot see
anything for their comfort. But when God is pleased to go before
them and unbar the gate of heaven, then they look up and see
such things as God is pleased to manifest to their souls. Then
they "pass through the gate." And the difficulties, trials,
temptations, and exercises that have lain in their path, like closed
gates, are removed when the breaker comes up before them.

Some of the Lord's people are exercised with powerful

temptations. And this makes access to God a closed gate. Others
of the Lord's people are greatly cast down in their minds because
they have not received the pardon of their sins. Others because
they are not brought into the enjoyment of gospel liberty. Others
because they have not had the application of Christ's blood to
their consciences. These are so many closed gates; but when the
breaker comes up before these gates, then they pass through the
gates and enter into the sweet enjoyment of those things which
are beyond the gate, such as the love of God, the salvation of
their souls, and all the rich treasures of love and mercy that are
beyond the gate. But the breaker goes up, the gate opens, and
they pass through it. Then they pass through that gate and have
some manifestation and discovery of these blessed realities to
their souls.

IV. But it goes on to say, "And their King shall pass before them,
and the Lord on the head of them." Now this King is the same as
the Breaker; the same as the Lord. This King is King Jesus, the
King of Zion, the King and Head of his covenant people. And why
is this expression used? Not only because he is their King, but
because they are his subjects. The titles given in Scripture to the
Lord Jesus Christ are not uselessly scattered up and down God's
Word, without a meaning to them. But every title that is given to
the Lord Jesus Christ is not only exactly adapted to the wants of
his children, but is suitable to the very text where it occurs. It is
like a diamond because it exactly fits it. So every text that speaks
of Jesus by any title, the text fits it, and it fits the text, and he is
the glory of it, as the diamond is the glory of the setting. So he is
called here "the King," not merely because he is a King, but
because they follow him as obedient subjects. And we never give
ourselves, our hearts and souls to Jesus; we never yield up our
affections unto him until he comes and manifests himself as a
breaker. But when he comes up in this great and glorious
character as breaker, to break the hard heart into contrition,
humility, and love; to break down the difficulties and obstacles
that lie in the road to Zion; to break down every temptation,
every besetment, and every snare, every sin, and everything
distressing to a living soul—when he breaks these things down by
his almighty love and power, then his children go in through the
gate and pass onward, and then the King passes before them.

He is a King because he is such a precious disposer of kingly

power; for you know the office of a king is to rule over his
subjects, and to fight their battles for them. Then when they yield
to him their hearts, and fall down before his footstool, he
becomes enthroned in their affections as King of Zion, and being
their King, he is to be at their head. What! is not a king to be at
the head of his people? What! a subject to precede the king?
What an indignity to the monarch! So when the Lord Jesus Christ
moves onward in royal dignity as Monarch and Prince, those who
know him, believe in his name, and love him in their hearts,
follow him obediently as his subjects. He says to such, "Forget
also thine own people, and thy father's house" (Ps. 45:10). He
addresses them tenderly as his people, and in the same way as
king Ahasuerus addressed the queen when she touched the
golden sceptre.

V. "And the LORD on the head of them." O what dignity is this

that the Lord Jehovah should be at their head! What if the Lord is
to be at your head? If he is to go before you in the way to glory,
what obstacle can there be in the path that he cannot, and will
not in a moment surmount? You have a hard heart. Can that
stand before the almighty power of God? You have an unbelieving
nature. Can that stand before the power of God put forth? You
have temptations, you have trials, you have difficulties, you have
hardness and darkness, and worldly-mindedness, pride,
presumption, and hypocrisy, every evil, every iniquity, nameable
and unnameable. But if you are God's people, the Lord Jesus
Christ is your King, the King of Zion. Everything must disappear
before him. And if he is the Lord Jehovah, who is to stand against
Jehovah, who can frown devils into hell in a moment, before
whose word creation itself would vanish like a scroll?

What a mercy it is for God's people to have the Lord Jehovah

going before them, making a way through the deep waters, as of
old he made a way through the Red Sea, and made every
difficulty to move, and every mountain to melt down, leading
them on in the ways of peace and righteousness. But some may
say, "How am I to know whether I am one of these people for
whom these mercies are written?" Let me ask you two questions.
First, have you found any difficulties in the way you are
travelling? Have you found the way you have been taking in
divine things a hard way, a difficult way, a strait and narrow way?
"Why," say you, "I have found it a very hard way, but I
sometimes fear lest my difficulties are natural difficulties." Now
do you not need a breaker to break them down for you? But let
me ask you a second question. Has the breaker ever done
anything for you? Any meltings, any movings, any softenings,
any humblings, any actings of faith, hope, and love; any godly
fear, any goings out to him in the yieldings of your heart's
worship, any subjection of spirit, any obedience to his blessed
will, ways, and word? Now if you can answer these two
questions; that you know by experience that the way you have
been led in is a difficult way, a distressing way, an afflicting way,
such a way as you never could have walked in of yourself, but
God has put you in and kept you in, then you have an evidence
that you are one of those to whom the promise is made. Have
you not found at times that the breaker is gone up, and has
melted, softened, and humbled your heart, and appeared for you,
when nothing but his hand could deliver? Then you have a further
testimony you are one of the Lord's people. And this breaker will
go before you all your days: and you will need this breaker, for all
your days you will need something to be broken down. And this
breaker will go before you all your days as your King and your
Lord, until he bring you safe to glory.
The Breastplate and the Helmet of the Christian Warrior

Preached at North Street Chapel, Stamford, on Lord's Day

Afternoon, September 23, 1866

"And let us, who are of the day, be sober, putting on the
breastplate of faith and love; and for an helmet, the hope of
salvation. For God hath not appointed us to wrath, but to obtain
salvation by our Lord Jesus Christ, who died for us, that, whether
we wake or sleep, we should live together with him." 2
Thessalonians 5:8, 9, 10

It seems, in some sense, wrong to have our favourites amongst

the Lord's family. Should we not, it might be justly asked, love all
the Lord's people alike? Are they not all loved with the same
eternal love, redeemed by the same precious blood, and made
partakers of the same Spirit? And yet I suppose few gracious
people are altogether exempt from favouritism. But is
favouritism, as a principle, right or wrong? To clear up this point,
I think we should examine the grounds of our preference of some
above others, and judge from them how far it is allowable and
how far not to have favourites. Some, for instance, of the Lord's
family are attractive from natural amiability of temper, or some
similar qualification unconnected with grace. Their unvaried
kindness and affection; their noble, liberal spirit; their
disinterested, unselfish conduct; their gentle, winning manners;
the absence in them of pride, haughtiness, and self-conceit; the
sincerity and truthfulness; even their personal attractions, and
other advantages of a similar kind carry with them a strange
power by which almost before we are aware they twine
themselves round our natural affections. Others again are
naturally disagreeable, sullen, morose, ill-tempered, obstinate,
selfish, unwilling to concede, rude in speech and rough in
manners, easily irritated and seemingly unable to forgive, never
satisfied but in being first and foremost, and determined to carry
out their own will and way with little consideration for the feelings
or judgment of others. Now, such persons will repel as much as
the others attract; and it is as hard not to dislike the one as it is
easy to like the other. And yet were these grounds of like and
dislike fairly examined, they might be found scarcely at all
connected with grace, and to rest almost wholly upon nature. The
naturally disagreeable, though I have drawn the lines strongly to
make the contrast greater, may have more real grace than those
who are naturally agreeable, and weighed in the balance of the
sanctuary, and viewed as members of the mystical body of
Christ, may have a much stronger claim upon our esteem and
affection, for some of the most amiable beings in the world have
no grace at all. If then your peculiar favourites even amongst the
Lord's family are so upon the ground of mere natural
qualifications, that reason of favouritism seems clearly wrong, for
we should love the Lord's people because they are his, and
because he has made them partakers of his Spirit and grace.

But now I think I can show you a true ground of favouritism as

well as a false one—one that is justified by the example of our
Lord and his apostles. Is it, then, wrong to love those most who
manifest most of the image of Christ, who seem most deeply
imbued with the spirit of their master, who walk most tenderly
and affectionately in the fear of God, who display most of the
grace of the gospel, and bear most fruits to the honour, praise,
and glory of God? Was there not one of the disciples whom the
Lord specially loved, who lay in his bosom at the last supper, and
to whom upon the cross he confided the care of his mother? And
does there not seem to have been a peculiar affection entertained
by Paul to his "dearly beloved son Timothy?"
But to what do these remarks tend and what connection have
they with the subject before us? They tend to this point: It seems
to me that as Timothy was one of Paul's favourite disciples, so
the church of Thessalonica was one of Paul's favourite churches.
If you will carefully read his two epistles to that church, bearing
at the same time in mind the remark that I have made, for we do
not always see a thing till our attention is called to it, you will find
a spirit of peculiar affection breathing through them both. And I
think you will find also evident reasons for this peculiarly
affectionate spirit manifested by the apostle toward the
Thessalonian believers. To show this more clearly, let me for a
moment compare the Thessalonian church with some of the other
churches of the New Testament. They were, then, much free from
that spirit of strife and division which almost rent to pieces the
Corinthian church. They had not the legal, Pharisaic spirit which
so tarnished the Galatians. They had not the vacillating spirit
which brought such discredit upon the Hebrews. Being young in
grace they might not have had, it is true, the strong faith of the
Romans which was "spoken of throughout the whole world," nor
the liberality of the Philippians who, when Paul was even in
Thessalonica, sent once and again unto his necessity; nor the
knowledge and wisdom of the Ephesians and Colossians which
qualified them to receive such deep truths as the apostle unfolds
to them in those remarkable epistles. They were a very young
church, for the epistle was not only the first which the apostle
wrote, but it was sent to them within a year after their call by
grace, and when they were yet in their first love. There was,
therefore, at this time in them such a spirit of brotherly kindness
and affection; their faith grew so exceedingly; their love of every
one toward each other so conspicuously abounded that in these
points they were a pattern to all the other churches. They were
also under very heavy persecutions from their own countrymen;
and yet in the midst of these outward trials the graces of faith
and patience shone so eminently forth that the apostle could say,
"We ourselves glory in you in the churches of God for your
patience and faith in all your persecutions and tribulations that ye
endure." (2 Thess. 1: 4.) There thus appear to have been some
good grounds in the case of this church why Paul should write to
it in a more loving, tender, and affectionate spirit than to any
other of the churches.

Thus there may be wrong and right grounds of favouritism. If,

therefore, the apostle had (as I cannot but think he had) a
favourite church, let us not condemn him as if he were influenced
by natural considerations, or as if he had favourites in the wrong
and invidious sense of the word; for if he had a special love to the
Thessalonian church, it was because the graces of the Spirit
shone forth most conspicuously in them, and because the very
persecutions which they were suffering for Christ's sake drew his
heart more lovingly and affectionately out towards them.

With a heart, then, overflowing with love and affection, he brings

before them the exhortation contained in our text, which you will
observe is closely connected with their character and privileges. It
is this spirit of tenderness and affection on the part of the
exhorter, and this spirit of loving obedience on the part of the
exhorted, which make the exhortations of the gospel so powerful
and effectual. But let us look at our text in connection with the
context.

The chapter begins thus: "But of the times and the seasons,
brethren, ye have no need that I write unto you. For yourselves
know perfectly that the day of the Lord so cometh as a thief in
the night. For when they shall say, Peace and safety; then
sudden destruction cometh upon them, as travail upon a woman
with child; and they shall not escape." (1 Thess. 5:1, 2, 3.)
Among other subjects of his preaching Paul had laid before the
Thessalonians the coming of the Lord, and that the day of his
coming would be as sudden and as unexpected by the world as
that of a thief in the night. He therefore contrasts the knowledge
and faith of believers with the ignorance and unbelief of the world
at large. "But ye, brethren, are not in darkness, that that day
should overtake you as a thief." A day was approaching when
sudden destruction would fall upon the ungodly, for the day of
the Lord so cometh as a thief in the night; and when that day
came upon them, as travail upon a woman with child, they should
not escape. But, writing to these warm-hearted, spiritually
minded, affectionate converts, he could say, "Ye, brethren, are
not in darkness, that that day should overtake you as a thief. Ye
are all the children of light, and the children of the day: we are
not of the night, nor of darkness." What, then? How ought we to
act? If we are the children of light, if we are the children of the
day, if we are not of the night nor of darkness, what should be
our conduct? "Therefore, let us not sleep, as do others; but let us
watch and be sober. For they that sleep sleep in the night; and
they that be drunken are drunken in the night." Then come the
words of our text: "But let us, who are of the day, be sober,
putting on the breastplate of faith and love; and for a helmet, the
hope of salvation. For God hath not appointed us to wrath, but to
obtain salvation by our Lord Jesus Christ, who died for us, that,
whether we wake or sleep, we should live together with him."

In opening up these words, I shall endeavour to consider our

subject under four leading points:—

I shall set before you four things as constituting and determining

a Christian—

I.—First, his character: he is "of the day."

II.—Secondly, his conduct: he is sober.

III.—Thirdly, his weapons: he puts on the breastplate of faith and

love, and for a helmet, the hope of salvation.

IV.—Fourthly, his watchword: that "God has not appointed us to

wrath, but to obtain salvation by our Lord Jesus Christ, who died
for us, that whether we wake or sleep, we should live together
with him."

I.—The distinguishing character here given by the apostle of a

Christian, of a believer in the Lord Jesus Christ, is that he is "of
the day."

We shall see more clearly the meaning and force of this

expression, by contrasting it with the description of those who are
of the night. There are children of light, and there are children of
the day. There are children of the night, and there are children of
darkness. The saint of God is especially characterised as a child of
light and a child of the day, as distinct from those who are
children of the night and children of darkness. I do not know that
the two terms, light and day, much differ from each other; and
yet, as the apostle has distinguished them, we may trace out a
difference between them. This difference, I think, at once strikes
the mind, the light is before the day and makes it. If there were
no light there could be no day; we therefore call that period of
time day which consists in the presence and enjoyment of light,
as we call that period of time night which is the presence and
effect of darkness.

i. In this sense, therefore, we are "children of the light" before we

are "children of the day." This light is what the Lord calls "the
light of life," that light which is produced by the creative act of
God in the new creation, as originally in the old, as the apostle
testifies: "For God, who commanded the light to shine out of
darkness, hath shined in our hearts, to give the light of the
knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ." (2 Cor.
4:6.) Until he that once said: "Let there be light," and there was
light, is pleased thus to shine into the soul of man, he is still in
darkness. It is, then, the possession of this peculiar and heavenly
light which stamps and distinguishes the partaker of heavenly
grace, and makes him to be of the day. The apostle therefore
says: "For ye were sometimes darkness, but now are ye light in
the Lord: walk as children of light." (Eph. 5:8.) Peter speaks of it
as God's "marvellous light:" "That ye should show forth the
praises of him who hath called you out of darkness into his
marvellous light." (1 Peter 2:9.) Paul was sent to the Gentiles "to
open their eyes and to turn them from darkness to light." (Acts
26:18.) John also speaks of "walking in the light as God is in the
light." (1 John 1:7.)

ii. Now the effect of this light in grace, as in nature, is to give

birth to the day. He, therefore, that is born of God is a child of
day, because he is a child of light. This is his mark. He is one,
then, whose eyes have been opened by the power of the Spirit of
God; whose mind has been enlightened; on whom the clean
water of which I spoke this morning has been sprinkled, so as to
cleanse his understanding from the old, inveterate crust of
ignorance and prejudice. He is also of the day, because the day-
star has risen in his heart; because beams and rays of the Sun of
righteousness have shone into his soul; because he is enlightened
with the light of the living; because he sees light in God's light;
and is brought out of nature's darkness and nature's death into
the light of God's countenance.
Now, when day dawns upon the earth, it discovers all the things
that are upon the face of the earth. When night brooded with its
sable wings over the face of creation, all was obscure, all was
hidden from view. All things were there, just as much as they are
in the full light of day; but they were not seen on account of the
veil of darkness which was spread over them. As in nature, so in
grace. Our state by nature, the wretched condition to which the
fall has reduced us, the evil of sin, the holiness of God, the purity
of his righteous character, the curse and condemnation of a holy
law, the dread realities of eternity, the bar of God before which all
must stand,—all these things, though realities, and in one sense,
tremendous realities, are hidden from view from the generality of
men, because over the heart of man rests the veil of darkness. Is
not this the testimony of God? When he speaks to his Zion, telling
her to "arise and shine," how he contrasts the glory of her light
with the gross, universal darkness which rests generally upon
men. "Arise, shine; for thy light is come, and the glory of the Lord
is risen upon thee. For, behold, the darkness shall cover the
earth, and gross darkness the people: but the Lord shall arise
upon thee, and his glory shall be seen upon thee." (Isa. 40:1, 2.)
So again: "They know not, neither will they understand; they
walk on in darkness: all the foundations of the earth are out of
course." (Psa. 82:5.) Our Lord declares: "He that followeth him
shall not walk in darkness;" and that "whosoever believeth in him
shall not abide in darkness" (John 8:12; 12:46); clearly implying
thereby, that those who do not believe in him, and follow him,
walk and abide in darkness. He tells us also, why it is that men
love darkness, and what is the just cause of their condemnation.
"And this is the condemnation, that light is come into the world,
and men loved darkness rather than light, because their deeds
were evil." (John 3:19.) Now, in this darkness all live and walk
until they are enlightened with what Elihu calls, "the light of the
living" (Job 33:30); until, "through the tender mercy of God, the
dayspring from on high visits them, to give light to them that sit
in darkness and in the shadow of death, to guide their feet into
the way of peace." (Luke 1:78, 79.) Then they are "delivered
from the power of darkness and translated into the kingdom of
God's dear Son." (Col.1:13.) It is, then, when divine light enters
into the understanding, according to the word, "The entrance of
thy words giveth light," that we are brought out of that state of
darkness, in which we should have continued until we had sunk
into the blackness of darkness for ever.

But what are the effects of this entrance of heavenly light? Its
first effect is to show us the being of God, who he is, and, as a
necessary consequence, what we are before him. We now see the
majesty, purity, holiness, and justice of that great and glorious
God in whose presence we feel to stand, and before whose heart-
searching eye we lie naked and open. We behold how righteous
he is in all his words, in all his works, in all his ways with the sons
of men. We see the tremendous evil of sin, and ourselves
amenable to the righteous law of God. We view the eye of Justice
fixed upon us, and we know we cannot escape that all-seeing
glance; we can neither evade it nor shun it, nor get anywhere
away from it and we feel ourselves to be within the reach of the
everlasting arm which can send us in a moment to a deserved
hell. We thus come into the experience of Psalm 139. "O Lord,
thou hast searched me, and known me. Thou knowest my
downsitting and mine uprising, thou understandeth my thought
afar off. Thou compassest my path and my lying down, and art
acquainted with all my ways. For there is not a word in my
tongue, but, lo, O Lord, thou knowest it altogether." (Psa. 139:1,
2, 3, 4.) We feel that we cannot flee from his presence, that even
"the darkness hideth not from him, and that the darkness and the
light to him are both alike." Such thoughts and feelings bring
about a wonderful revolution in the mind, for we have not now to
deal with man but with God; not with the things of time, but the
solemn realities of eternity.

It is, then, this divine light shining into his heart which manifests
the living saint of God to be of the day. He is now truly and
emphatically a child of the day. Day has come to him, a day of
days, a day whose light is as the light of seven days, for all other
days have been with him days of darkness. Having come, then,
into the light of day, and being a child of the day, he will have
such discoveries made to him as will make it more or less the day
of the Lord with his soul. At first, indeed, he has to learn his base
original, the depth of the fall, the dreadful evil of sin, and how
dreadfully and awfully he has often been entangled therein. He
has to learn the holiness of God, the purity of his righteous
character, the unbending severity of his holy law, and his special
case as amenable thereto in body and soul for time and eternity.
A sense of these things will teach him his inability and
helplessness to save and deliver himself, and make him feel that
if saved, it must be by pure mercy and sovereign grace. Here,
perhaps, he may abide for months or even years without any
clear assurance of his salvation, though not without hopes and
expectations. But having opened his eyes, brought him thus far
into light, and made him a child of day, God will not leave him
here, but will perfect that which concerneth him. There are
blessed truths stored up in the everlasting gospel relating to the
Person, work, blood, and righteousness of his dear Son which will
in due time be revealed to his faith. The same Spirit who
convinced him of sin, will in due time bring peace and consolation
into his breast. The same Spirit who opens up the purity of God in
a holy law, shows the love and grace of God in the everlasting
gospel; and the same divine teaching which makes the child of
light believe that he is a sinner condemned by the law gives him
to believe he is a saint saved by the blood of Christ, and has an
interest in the perfect obedience of the Son of God. Thus, as the
child of light is gradually led along, the day opens more and more
with brightness, clearness, and blessedness to his view; the
glorious truths of the gospel become more discovered in their
beauty and blessedness; the Lord Jesus Christ is more plainly
revealed; the work of grace upon the soul is made more
manifest, and the teachings of the Spirit become more clear until
it may be said: "Therefore if any man be in Christ, he is a new
creature: old things are passed away; behold, all things are
become new." (2 Cor. 5:17.)

II.—But now, let me pass on to show what the conduct of that

man is who is thus of the day. What was he by contrast when he
was a child of night, a child of darkness?
i. When a child of night, he did those things which are done in the
night. We know that sins of every kind are chiefly transacted
under the veil of darkness. Men do not usually come abroad in
open day with their evil deeds. They seek to shroud their crimes
beneath the veil of night, little thinking that the eye of God is
upon them as much by night as by day. Now while we were
children of darkness, we might have been in some good measure
kept from those gross immoralities and open sins in which so
many walk without fear or shame. We might have preserved a
consistent character before the world, and not only no gross
deviations from moral conduct might have stained us with
outward reproach, but we might have been generally esteemed
and admired for our uprightness and conscientiousness. But all
this time we had no regard to inward sins; we paid no attention
to the secret movements of our fallen nature towards evil. Nor
indeed did we know that many things were sinful which we now
see to be highly so. Pride, ambition, covetousness, fondness of
dress and outward appearance, love of gaiety and amusement,
conformity to the fashions, customs, maxims, opinions, and
general spirit of the world, seeking our own advantage, despising
the family of God, dislike to and contempt of the truths of the
gospel, a general habit of prayerlessness and carelessness, and a
determined and unceasing living to ourselves and the things of
time and sense without regard to the word of God—in these sins
which held us fast we saw no evil, nor did we know, or at least
feel that they were displeasing in the eyes of God. Nor did we see
that secret sin was, in the sight of God, as much sin as open sin;
and that the indulgence of evil without check or restraint in the
mind was little less criminal before the eyes of infinite purity than
the indulgence of actual transgression. I do not by this make all
sins equal or that transgressions in thought are to be compared
with transgressions in deed, for every man's conscience will tell
him the contrary. But as long as we could enjoy the various
objects in which our carnal mind delighted, and a decent veil was
thrown over our own outward conduct, we were well satisfied;
and were little careful about the inside of the cup and platter, if
the outside were but decently clean, or at least kept as smooth
and as bright as that of our neighbours. And if sometimes
conscience sharply rapped us for an occasional breaking out into
what was felt to be positively wrong, we thought all might be
washed away with a few tears of repentance; and that all we had
to do was to confess our sins before God, go a little oftener to
church, or receive the sacrament, and then we should easily get
remission for sins not of any very grave character. In this
smooth, easy, self-deceptive path, not, perhaps, without some
occasional desires and attempts to be different and act otherwise,
we went on filling up the measure of our iniquities, until but for
the all-prevailing grace of God we should have fallen victims to
everlasting flame.

ii. But the apostle gives us another mark of the children of

darkness: they sleep. "Let us not sleep," he says, "as do others,
for they that sleep sleep in the night."

Night is the time for sleep; and this sleep of the body, which is
natural and healthful, the apostle transfers to the sleep of the
soul, which is its disease, not its needful rest or means of health.
By the sleep of the soul he means its insensible state, the idea
being taken from the state of the body during sleep. This sleep of
the soul is its destruction. Solomon speaks of one who "lieth
down in the midst of the sea," and of another that "lieth upon the
top of a mast," as an illustration of the man who tarries long at
his wine, whose eyes behold strange women, and whose heart
utters perverse things. By this forcible illustration he intimates
the reckless, insensible, and therefore perilous state of the
drunkard. "They have stricken me, shalt thou say, and I was not
sick; they have beaten me, and I felt it not: when shall I awake?
I will seek it yet again." (Prov. 23:35.) Now, this illustration we
may apply to such a drunken sleep as buries in insensibility the
children of darkness. They have no sense of the awful position in
which they stand. They do not see there is but a step between
them and death; how a moment might plunge them into an awful
eternity; how a falling tile, an accident on a railway, a horse
running away, an apoplectic fit, might in a moment launch them
into an eternal state without repentance of their sins or even a
cry for mercy. Their sleep, then, is the sleep of the drunkard,
during which he is exposed to a thousand dangers, against which
he has neither will nor power to guard himself.

Now, God's people, as distinct from them, are shown in our text
to be "sober." "Let us watch and be sober." And as if he would,
by repeating it, urge it more upon their spiritual attention, he
says again, "But let us who are of the day be sober."

Sobriety is, therefore, a distinguishing mark of a child of grace;

by which we are to understand not merely natural sobriety, not
merely freedom from the prevalence of those intoxicating habits
and customs which are such a foul blot on the face of society,
which are England's greatest curse, and have been a cause of
death to thousands, and of incalculable ruin to widows and
children. Christian sobriety is not merely that sobriety which is
becoming to all, and indispensable to every one who names the
name of Jesus, but Christian sobriety, spiritual sobriety,
soberness of mind as distinct from soberness of body. There is a
vast deal of meaning comprehended in the expression "Be ye
sober," for it is of very extensive application. It is much the same
as that "soundness of mind" which the apostle speaks of as God's
special gift, together with the spirit of power and of love. (l Tim.
1:7.) And it is observable that in bidding Titus "speak the things
which become sound doctrine," he urges him to exhort both old
and young, male and female, to sobriety of mind and conduct.
(Titus 2:1-7.) Men often accuse those who profess the doctrines
of grace of enthusiasm, of fanaticism, of embracing wild
doctrines, and being led aside by visionary delusions. I do not
deny that there are enthusiasts and fanatics, and that Satan can
deceive and delude as an angel of light; and I admit that some
even of the people of God are inclined to be visionary, both in
their experience and their expectations. But fanatics and
enthusiasts, in the true sense of the words, are not usually nor
often found in the ranks of those who are truly taught of God.
Indeed, it would be a libel upon the teaching of the Holy Spirit to
assert that his instruction is either fanatical or enthusiastic. Nay, I
would rather retort the charge and assert that the real fanatics
and enthusiasts are those who dream of serving at the same time
sin and God, who are looking for heaven as the reward of their
works, when all those works are evil. And as to true sobriety of
mind, and calm collectedness of judgment, I believe, myself, that
none are so sober-minded as the real partakers of grace. Before
the light of God's teaching illuminated their understanding, before
the grace of God in its regenerating influence took possession of
their hearts, they were out of their minds. There was no real
sanity in them, for, like insane persons, they were madly bent
upon their own destruction. They spent their lives in insane
hopes, in wild and visionary dreams of happiness, ever stretching
forth their hands to grasp what always eluded their reach, and,
like madmen, alternately laughed and wept, danced and sang as
on the brink of a precipice or the deck of a sinking ship. But when
grace came to illuminate their mind, regenerate their soul, and
begin that work which should fit and prepare them for eternity,
they became sober. They were awakened from that state of
intoxication in which they had spent their former life; they were
sobered out of that drunkenness, so to speak, in the indulgence
of which they had drunk down large draughts of intoxicating
pleasure, and became for the first time morally and spiritually
sober.

iii. You will observe, that the apostle says: "They that be drunken
are drunken in the night;" and contrasting their drunkenness with
their Christian sobriety, he adds: "But let us, who are of the day,
be sober." We find, then, here drunkenness contrasted with
sobriety. There are, therefore, other forms and modes of
drunkenness besides that of being intoxicated with strong drink.
Let me point out some of these points of contrast, for men may
be drunk, mentally and morally, whose brain does not reel with
the cups of the drunkard. As the Lord says: "They are drunken,
but not with wine; they stagger, but not with strong drink." And
why? Because the "Lord had poured out upon them the spirit of
deep sleep," which was as the drunken sleep of those actually
overcome with wine. (Isai. 29:9, 10.) Similarly, the woman in the
Revelation is represented, as "drunken with the blood of the
saints." So we read of "the drunkards of Ephraim" who are to be
"trodden under feet."

Of these drunkards, some are drunk with the love of sin, others
with the love of the world, others through having imbibed some
pernicious error, others with enmity against the saints of God,
others with pride, Pharisaism, and self-righteousness—steeped up
to the very lips, as a drunkard is, with vain ideas of their own
strength and ability. As strong drink stupefies some and inflames
others; as it makes some sleep and others contentious; so it is
with these drunkards of Ephraim, who are out of the way through
strong drink, who err in vision and stumble in judgment. But all
their glorious beauty is a "fading flower," for "the Lord hath a
mighty and strong one, which as a tempest of hail and a
destroying storm, as a flood of mighty waters overflowing, will
one day cast them down to the earth." (Isa. 28:1-3.)

1. Now opposed to these drunkards—drunken, as I have

explained, in a spiritual sense, and not necessarily with strong
drink, are the sober-minded children of God. By sobriety, in a
spiritual sense, we may understand every thought and feeling,
word and work, state of soul and experience of the power of truth
which is contrary to that spiritual drunkenness which I have
described. Grace sobers a man, and it does it in this way. Its first
effect is to make him put away the intoxicating draught. This, we
know, is the first step, literally and naturally, to make a drunkard
a sober man. Nothing can be done until the strong drink is given
up. "Put away thy wine from thee," was the exhortation given to
Hannah by Eli, when, misjudging her, he thought she had been
drunken. So grace, when it visits the heart, beats out of the hand
the cup of error. Error suits our carnal mind as strong drink suits
the palate of the drunkard; some it inflames and some it
stupefies; some it sets a preaching and some it sets a fighting.
The excitement it produces, the wild dreams and delusions to
which it gives birth, the scenes of novelty it brings before the
mind make error to be the very cup of the spiritual drunkard. The
first thing that grace does is to give us a knowledge of the truth,
as I explained when I was speaking upon the entrance of divine
light. Light and truth go together. "Send forth," says David, "thy
light and thy truth, let them lead me, let them bring me unto thy
holy hill and to thy tabernacles." (Psa. 43:3.) Wherever, then,
light and truth come, they detect error and make it hateful; and
there is no longer seeking "mixed wine," no longer "looking upon
it when it is red, when it giveth its colour in the cup, when it
moves itself aright;" for it is found "at the last, to bite like a
serpent and sting like an adder." Having, therefore, once tasted
the power and sweetness of the truth which he has drawn from
the pure word of God, if error come before him, the child of the
light and of the day regards it with abhorrence.

2. In a similar way, he can no longer be drunk with the love of

sin. If he sin it is contrary to his will, to his inclination, to his
prayers, his groans, and his honest and sincere confessions. He
may be entangled in it, but he does not love it as the ungodly do,
with all his heart and soul. He is not like the drunkard who seeks
his cup because he loves it; and though stricken and beaten in his
drunken sleep, yet says: "They have beaten me and I felt it not,
when shall I awake? I will seek it yet again!" If he is entangled in
the snares of sin and Satan, he is overcome by them contrary to
a thousand cries and struggles of his labouring breast.

3. Nor is he drunk with enmity to God's will and way, though it

may cross his own, for he desires God's will to be his will; and his
greatest grief is, that he cannot do the will of God through the
weakness and opposition of the flesh.
4. Nor is he drunk with enmity to the Lord's people, with that
intoxicating spirit, which, at its greatest height, is called being
"drunken with the blood of the saints," because he loves the
people of God, and would almost sooner shed his blood for them
than shed theirs.

5. Nor is he drunk with the spirit of the world, because he knows

how it is opposed to everything good and godly; and what he has
felt, both of the severity and goodness of God, has made him see
and feel the difference between the spirit of the world and the
Spirit of Christ.
6. Nor is he drunk with worldly ambition, worldly pride, worldly
projects, or worldly prospects, for he sees how opposed all these
things are to the mind of Christ, and though they may be sweet
to the carnal mind, yet he knows that there is poison in the
draught, and death in the cup.

iv. Again, he is sober as respects watchfulness. We find the

apostle uniting sobriety and watchfulness as both equally
necessary to the child of day. Sobriety, therefore, includes not
merely abstaining from everything which intoxicates, but also
that alertness and watchfulness of mind, and that spirit of
carefulness which are opposed to the carelessness of the sleepy,
slumbering drunkard. The Christian is a soldier who must not
sleep upon his post; a sentinel who must not fall asleep in the
sentry box. He is in an enemy's country, is placed in an advanced
post that he may be alert and on the watch, listening to every
noise and every movement, and keeping his eyes well open, so
as at once to give an alarm and not suffer the camp to be
surprised. A Christian who is not watchful is sure to be surprised
and overcome; and as the past experience of the evils of
drunkenness will sometimes make a drunkard sober, so his past
experience of the dangers of carelessness will make a believer
watchful. He knows how often he has been entangled by some
evil of his heart through want of due care, and what an
advantage Satan has gained over him through a want of
watchfulness. He is almost like a sentinel who has charge over a
powder magazine and has to watch every comer. He knows what
combustible material he carries in his own bosom, and how soon
this material is set on fire by the fiery darts of hell; and he sees
what consequences might be produced by his giving way to the
first inclinations to evil. Grace also has made him tender of the
cause of God, and jealous of his honour and glory. He sees what
a dreadful thing it would be to bring an open reproach upon the
truth of God and the people with whom he is connected; and that
he himself might go with broken bones all his days, might darken
and becloud all his evidences, and make every body suspect him
of hypocrisy, and none more so than himself. It is the union of
these various motives and feelings working together in his breast,
which, under the good hand of God, makes and keeps him sober
and watchful, and to stand daily and continually upon his watch
tower, lest any enemy unwarily surprise him.

III.—But I pass on to show the Christian's armour. The Lord, who

has bidden him watch and be sober, has not left him without
equipping him with suitable armour against every foe. It would
not be sufficient for a sentry to be merely watchful, merely sober.
He must be armed as well as watchful; he must carry his rifle,
and well know the use of it,—to shoot down the approaching
enemy if he meditate attack as well as see him in the distance
and give the alarm. So it is in grace. The Lord does not send his
people forth to fight the good fight and give them no weapons
wherewith to approve themselves as good soldiers of Jesus
Christ.

But you will observe, that in our text defensive, and not
offensive, weapons are mentioned. In the corresponding list of
spiritual armour given, Eph. 6, "the sword of the Spirit," an
offensive weapon, is mentioned. But as here none but defensive
are named, we will confine our attention to them. "Putting on the
breastplate of faith and love, and for a helmet the hope of
salvation." Let us examine these weapons severally.

i. The first is "the breastplate of faith and love." This seems to be

the same breastplate as the apostle speaks of in Eph. 6, though
he calls it there "the breastplate of righteousness," that is,
Christ's righteousness, for it is his not ours which can alone
protect us. As Hart justly says:

"Righteousness within thee rooted,

May appear to take thy part;
But let righteousness imputed,
Be the breastplate of thine heart."

But, why should the apostle call it here "the breastplate of faith
and love?" I think we may explain it by considering that the
breastplate of righteousness is put on by faith, and firmly
fastened to the breast by love. Scripture figures must not be
interpreted too rigidly. They are intended more as illustrations
than positive declarations of the truth; and thus the blessed Spirit
may use different figures to unfold and explain the same truth,
holding it up, as it were, in different lights, and presenting it to us
under different aspects. Bearing this in mind, let us now take a
view of the Christian soldier. He stands sober and watchful at his
post, stands upon his tower looking watchfully around; he knows
that he is surrounded by enemies; and as he casts his eyes here
and there with keen, scrutinising looks, that he may not be
surprised unawares, how soon he sees one bending a bow here,
another holding a spear there, and a third ready to spring upon
him with a drawn sword. Now, how is he to be preserved from
their attacks when he knows that they are all thirsting for his life?
God has provided for him in his dear Son a breastplate, the
breastplate of righteousness; and as he views this imputed
righteousness of the Son of God to all who believe as a part of
the spiritual armour provided for them he sees what a suitable
protection it is for himself. Faith, therefore, as acting in the
strength and by the power of God, embraces and puts this
breastplate on; and as faith works by love, this grace of the Spirit
binds it closely round his bosom with the strongest clasps.

Now, observe, what the breastplate is to guard. There are two

important organs in the human body, each of which has its seat
in what we now call the chest, but what was formerly spoken of
as the breast. These are the heart and the lungs. These are two
vital organs, two of the most important of the whole system.
From our heart issues the blood which feeds every member of our
body. How important, how vital is this organ! So, spiritually, by
our heart we live, by our heart we believe, and by our heart we
love. Every tender sensation, every gracious movement, every
inward experience of the goodness and mercy of God which
prompts the falling tear, and heaving sigh, may all be traced to
the heart. The heart of man, naturally and spiritually, is the very
seat and centre of life; and when it beats strongly and firmly in
the breast, every movement is felt to the remotest extremities.
We may feel it even now in the pulse of our wrist, if you put your
finger upon it, for as our heart beats strongly or weakly, so does
that beat in unison with it. A strong, vigorous heart sends blood
to every part of the body, and is the strength of every muscle
and of every limb. So, when the heart beats strongly and firmly in
faith and love to the Lord Jesus, when he dwells in the heart by
faith, and occupying the seat of our affections, makes himself
near, dear and precious, it sends a vigorous tide of healthy blood
to every part of our spiritual frame. Do you not feel at times as if
animated with fresh warmth and spirit to fight the good fight of
faith, that you, by his grace, may come off more than conqueror
through him who hath loved you? But the heart, spiritually, as
well as literally, wants protection. Satan aims at the heart his
most fiery darts. O, if he can but quench our faith; if he can but
overcome our love; if he can but strike a dart through the very
seat and centre of our religion; if he can but succeed in aiming a
deadly blow against that vital organ, that heart whereby we
believe unto righteousness, how he would triumph in our
destruction. Here is the need and value of the breastplate. When,
then, we are enabled by faith to take hold of Christ's
righteousness, apply it to our breast, and gird it round with bands
of love, how this breastplate meets and repels every fiery dart.
Satan will sometimes urge: "Your sins are too great to be
forgiven; no one who truly fears God ever sinned like you," There
is a fiery dart; how can it be met but by the breastplate of
imputed righteousness? At another time he will say: "Your
backslidings are too great to be healed; indeed they are not
backslidings, but the sins of a hypocrite and a reprobate." How
can this fiery dart be repelled but by the breastplate of Christ's
righteousness? Is not that sufficient to justify us before the
throne of God? Do we not read, that "by him all that believe are
justified from all things from which they could not be justified by
the law of Moses?" And does not the blood of Jesus Christ cleanse
from all sin? Is not this enough? Can any fiery dart of the wicked
pierce this corslet, find its way through this breastplate? Was not
this breastplate wrought out by the sufferings and obedience of
the Son of God? And is it not given to protect the breast of God's
people, and to shield them from every fiery dart of the enemy?
Sometimes, again, Satan stirs up every wicked thought of your
heart, inflames every dormant lust, stirs up every vile
imagination, nay, will invent crimes if he cannot find them ready
made to his hand. Has he never tried to persuade you that you
have said what you have never said, and done what you have
never done; or troubled you with dreams in which you have
committed all manner of sins, and taken advantage of the night
season, when you have awoke, trembling and distressed out of
them, to bring every gloomy thought before your eyes, as if you
had actually committed what you have but dreamed of? How can
you meet this foe when he is thus aiming his darts at your heart,
by night as well as by day, in dreaming hours as well as wakeful
moments? Only by putting on the breastplate of righteousness by
the hand of faith, and girding it on by the bands of love.

ii. Then our lungs. How important, how vital an organ naturally
are they. By them we inhale and exhale the vital air. By them is
our blood purified and life preserved in our frame. This may
represent spiritually, prayer, which is the very life of the soul; for
by prayer we draw in the vital breath of heaven, and again give
out what is thus drawn in. This Satan well knows. He, therefore,
aims his darts against the spirit of prayer in a believer's breast.
How, sometimes, when upon our bended knees, Satan will throw
in a fiery dart. How he will stir up some vile lust or raise up some
foul imagination, seeking to distract our attention and fill our
minds with horror. Sometimes he will bring worldly things into
the mind to carry our thoughts away, we know not where. How
he will suggest all manner of things as taking place that never
have occurred and never will occur, or that something of the
greatest importance must be attended to immediately. In these,
and various ways, he will seek to bring into a state of confusion,
in which not a single prayer seems to rise out of our heart or any
true worship of God. Here, then, we need the breastplate of
righteousness to cover and shield that vital organ by which we
draw in the breath of heaven, and from which the same breath,
as being of his own inspiration, mounts upward and enters the
ears of the Lord of Sabaoth.
iii. But we have another piece of armour provided, and that, you
will observe, is to guard our head, another vital part, not less so
than heart and lungs. No part of the body is naturally more
unprotected or more needs protection. This cover is provided for
us by a spiritual helmet, as our text speaks: "And for a helmet,
the hope of salvation."

The head is the seat of all our knowledge, as the heart is the seat
of all our faith and feeling. Does not life eternal consist in a
knowledge of the only true God and Jesus Christ whom he hath
sent? This knowledge, therefore, may be said to be our salvation,
and a good hope through grace, which the Lord kindles in a
believer's breast assures him that a true knowledge of the Lord in
which is eternal life is therefore connected with his salvation. But
whence arises this good hope through grace? Does it not spring
out of some discovery of the Lord's goodness and love, some
whisper of his favour, or intimation of his kindness, some
gracious token, some sips, tastes, and drops of his abundant
mercy and grace? Here, then, we see the advantage of the
helmet. Satan aims a deadly blow at your religion. He tells you
that you were never called by grace, that what you thought was a
work of grace, had no reality in it, that your experience is not
genuine or saving, and that it was merely something which
nature furnished you with. He intimates that your joys were
visionary, and your delight in the Lord was only natural
excitement; that in your convictions there was no depth, no
reality, no genuineness, and for your consolations no solid
foundation; for if they had been of God, he tells you, they would
have been continued, and you would not have lost them; they
would have been permanent and you would not be where you
now are, so cold, dead, stupid, and indifferent. Thus Satan comes
in with his suggestions, aiming a deadly blow at your head—the
very seat of all our understanding and knowledge of the truth—
the very centre of our spiritual senses, of the eyes we see with,
the ears we hear with, the nose we smell with, the lips we speak
with, and almost every other guiding, directing sense. Against
these deadly blows is provided the helmet of a good hope
through grace.
But let us now see how it is put on, and how it wards off these
deadly thrusts. Does not a good hope enable you to meet Satan
sometimes thus? "Aye, but God has told me, and so made me to
believe that he has done something for my soul! Have I not had
that sweet promise, that gracious manifestation, that token for
good, that faith in the Lord which I am sure nature never could
have given me, which I am sure must have been from the Lord,
from the effects it produced?" This is a putting on of the helmet,
and as thus put on, it shields the head in the day of battle.

IV.—Now the watchword. The Christian sentinel does not stand

upon the watch without a watchword given him by his great
commander, the Lord of hosts. But what is the watchword? I call
it the watchword, though it consists of several words, and yet all
breathing the same language and expressing the same idea. Let
us, then, listen to it, and see whether we can find it suitable for
ourselves, as having reason to hope that we have been called to
fight this great battle, and as such, to stand diligently upon the
watch. "God hath not appointed us to wrath, but to obtain
salvation by our Lord Jesus Christ."

i. The first portion of this watchword we may divide into two

parts; one negative, the other positive,—one what God has not
done, the other what God has done. Hear, then, the first notes.

1. "God hath not appointed us to wrath." This is meant for our

encouragement, to strengthen our faith and hope, and keep us
sober and vigilant. How different might it have been with us. How
just and righteous would God have been if his thoughts towards
us had not been thoughts of peace, but of evil. And O, where
might we even now have been if God had appointed us to wrath?
Even now, instead of being in the house of prayer and still upon
hoping, praying ground, we might have been lifting up our eyes
in hell, being in torment. Thus a child of God sometimes gathers
up a good hope by his being spared in life and being. He sees
what a mercy it is that he is still on praying ground; that God did
not cut him down, as he deserved, when he was an open foe, and
daily adding to the catalogue of his sins; nor abandoned him to
utter impenitence, unbelief, and carelessness. From this
longsuffering and tender forbearance of God, hope is sometimes
gathered up, that God has not appointed him to wrath.

2. But again, if God had appointed him to wrath, he feels that he

would have been left unconcerned as before, in darkness as
before, in death as before; he would never have known or
experienced any inclination toward the good way; never had a
sigh or cry put into his heart; that the Lord would never have
convinced him of sin, brought him upon his knees, given him a
place or name among the sons and daughters of the Most High, if
he were altogether a vessel of wrath filling up the measure of his
iniquities. Thence he gathers a good hope that he is not
appointed to wrath. You will remember how the wife of Manoah
encouraged him on these grounds: "If the Lord were pleased to
kill us he would not have received a burnt offering and a meat
offering at our hands; neither would he have showed us all these
things, nor would, as at this time, have told us such things as
these." (Judges 13:23.)

3. So also the various interpositions of Providence, the various

instances in which God has signally appeared for him, the many
answers to prayer when under very distressing circumstances,
will sometimes raise up in a Christian's breast a hope that God
has not appointed him to wrath, or else he would have not been
so kind to him in the mingled events of life. He looks at his past
life, sees how he has been raised up time after time from beds of
sickness, when others have fallen and, perhaps, died without
hope. Thus he stands and marvels at the goodness of God in
sparing him and removing others, and gathers up a good hope
that these are marks of the Lord's favour to him.

4. He finds sometimes also his heart broken and dissolved under

a sense of God's unmerited mercy, and says, "Surely, these are
not marks of an alien and an enemy; surely these are not signs of
one who is dead in sin, of one who is a stranger to God and
godliness." Enemies to God do not want to be friends with him;
foes do not long for reconciliation; lovers of the world do not seek
to be lovers of God, and those that love sin do not want to walk
in holiness.

5. He gathers up also a good hope through grace if he finds in

himself marks and evidences of a clearer and more positive
nature than those which I have just named, such as breakings
into his soul of the goodness and mercy of God; and when he
hears those evidences traced out by men of God, when he plainly
sees them marked down also in the word as intimations of grace
possessed, he gathers up a good hope, if no further, that the Lord
has been merciful to him, and has not appointed him to wrath.

ii. But let me now come to the positive portion of our watchword.
God has appointed us to obtain salvation.

Let us see, then, how this part of the watchword encourages and
consoles the Christian soldier. A view is given to him of salvation,
and he sees plainly and clearly that it is a full and free salvation
by our Lord Jesus Christ, by his blood and righteousness, by his
meritorious work upon the cross, by his blood-shedding and
sacrifice there. He has a view by faith of salvation in all its
fulness, freeness, suitability, and blessedness. He despairs of
salvation in and by himself; he knows he is lost if he has no other
righteousness but his own. He has no dependence upon the
works of the law, no confidence in the flesh; but he does see a
glorious salvation wrought out by the Son of God. He does view
the atoning blood: he does see a righteousness wrought out by
the obedience of the Son of God; and he knows there is an
obtaining of this salvation as a personal, enjoyed, and felt reality
when freely given by the hand of God. As, then, he stretches
forth the trembling hand of his faith to lay hold of this salvation,
and finds a measure of sweetness, blessedness, calm and peace,
tranquility and happiness, distilling over the secret chambers of
his soul as he lays hold of and embraces it, it confirms him still
more in the blessed persuasion that God has not appointed him
to wrath, but to obtain salvation by our Lord Jesus Christ. He is
thus strengthened with strength in his soul to press more and
more after salvation, that he may have its sweets distilled more
and more fully, more and more abundantly into his breast, the
joys of salvation more powerfully opened up in his soul, the
blessedness of salvation more clearly sealed upon his heart. He
views it all in Christ, stored up there; and he puts forth the hand
of faith to obtain that salvation as a personal reality sealed upon
his heart by the witnessing power of God the Holy Spirit. As,
then, the power of these things is made manifest in his heart, he
feels a sweet persuasion that God has not given him up nor
abandoned him to sin and self, nor appointed him to wrath, but
to obtain salvation by the Lord Jesus Christ. He now sees who it
was that made him a child of day; who it was that brought him
out of night and darkness; who it was that made him sober and
watchful in prayer; who it was that gave him a breastplate of
faith and love, and for a helmet the hope of salvation. Thus
gathering up strength and consolation in his soul from viewing
these marks and tokens of a gracious God, he presses on more
and more to obtain salvation by our Lord Jesus Christ; and every
opening view of salvation renews his strength, encourages his
faith, enlarges his hope, and swells his affection, until he obtains
as a precious boon in his own bosom a full, free salvation by our
Lord Jesus Christ.

iii. But now for the second portion of the watchword—not less
encouraging: who died for us, that whether we wake or sleep, we
should live together with him.

Here is the second part of the watchword: the certainty of the

death of Christ, and of our living together with him because he
died and now lives for us. But, observe how tenderly the apostle
speaks here. Sometimes we wake, and alas, we often sleep;
sometimes we are sober, and alas, often we are unwatchful. The
apostle meets this case, which seems to be so against us as
sentinels and watchmen. "Well," he would say, as if speaking for
the Lord, "thou hast not been so watchful as thou shouldst have
been; thou hast been sleeping on thy post; thou hast not now
that measure of godly sobriety which thou hadst in days past;
thou hast wandered a little from thy first love. Shalt thou, then,
perish? Must this be for thy destruction? Does it prove thee a
deserter, and that thou art a traitor? As a slumbering sentinel,
thou deservest to die the death. But thou didst not surrender thy
arms, and thou art still faithful to thy post, yet wert overcome by
nodding when thou shouldst have been wakeful. Shalt thou be
carried off and exposed to the murderous shot according to the
articles of war? No, I will spare thee; because though thou didst
deserve death, thou still art not a traitor to me. Thou wert
sleeping when thou shouldst have been watchful; thou wert not
so sober as thou shouldst have been; but I will not take
advantage of thee, cut thee off and send thee to hell, nor adjudge
thee to die the traitor's death, nor hang thee up as a deserter for
an example to others. Christ died for thee, and therefore thou art
spared. But let this be a lesson for the time to come. Be more
sober; look more to the enemy. I will not take advantage of thy
sleeping, but be thou more cautious for the future."

Thus whether we sleep or wake, we equally shall live together

with him, because he died for us. Now, to live together with him,
is to live in this life a life of faith, and to live in the life to come a
life of enjoyment; to live whilst here below a life of grace, Christ
being, our life, that we may live a life of glory and happiness
above.

Thus have I shown you the Christian's character, the Christian's

conduct, the Christian's weapons, and the Christian's watchword.
Can I say of you, can you say of yourself, you are a Christian in
character, a Christian in conduct, a Christian by your weapons,
and a Christian by your watchword? Look at these things: they
are the solemn truth of God; and if the Lord is pleased to seal his
word with any measure of power upon your soul; if from my
description this afternoon you can read your character as a
Christian, your conduct as a Christian, your warfare as a
Christian, and your watchword as a Christian, make it manifest
you are what you profess to be, a Christian indeed, and then you
will have no cause to fear when Christ appears a second time
without sin unto salvation, when he shall come to be admired in
his saints, and glorified in all them that believe.
THE BRUISED REED AND SMOKING FLAX

Preached at Eden Street Chapel, Hampstead Road, on Lord's Day

Evening, August 10, 1851

"A bruised reed shall he not break, and smoking flax shall he not
quench, till he send forth judgment unto victory." Matthew 12:20

A child of God in himself is all weakness. Others may boast of

their strength; he has none, and feels to have none. But it is one
thing to subscribe to this truth as a matter of doctrine, and
another to be acquainted with it as a matter of inward, personal
experience. It must be learnt, painfully for the most part,
inwardly learnt under the teachings of the Spirit. Now it is this
weakness, experimentally, known and felt, that opens the way for
a personal experience of the strength of Christ; for when Paul
was groaning under the buffetings of Satan and the festering
throbs of the thorn in the flesh, the Lord himself said to him, "My
grace is sufficient for thee, for my strength is made perfect in
weakness." If, therefore, we know not experimentally what
weakness is, we cannot know experimentally what it is to have
the strength of Christ made perfect in that weakness.

In our text a tried Christian is set forth under two striking

similitudes. He is compared,

1. to a "bruised reed;" and

2. to "smoking flax." And of the Lord it is most graciously said,

that this "bruised reed" he will not "break," and this "smoking
flax" he will not "quench." Nay more, so far from breaking the
one, or quenching the other, he will never leave his gracious work
in the soul until he "send forth judgment unto victory."

In looking, then, at the words this evening, I shall, as far as the

Lord may enable:
I.—Consider the character of the tried Christian under these two
similitudes—"A bruised reed," and "smoking flax."

II.—Shew that the gracious Redeemer will not "break" the one,
nor "quench" the other; but

III.—That he will eventually "send forth judgment unto

victory."

I.—Can we find a more striking emblem of weakness than a reed?

A Christian is not here compared to an oak that spreads its roots
deep in the soil, and tosses its sturdy arms abroad into the sky,
that stands the brunt of a thousand storms, and outlives
revolving centuries. That were an inappropriate emblem of so
feeble, so frail a creature as a needy, necessitous sinner. But
when the blessed Spirit would use a similitude most strikingly
descriptive of a dependant upon grace, of a pauper upon alms, he
takes that simple yet familiar figure of a reed. Let us examine the
points of resemblance:

1. A reed, though mean, humble, despicable, unknown, and

unnoticed by the eye that rests with admiration on the towering
oak or spreading cedar, is yet a partaker of life; and this life is
deep down in the root. But the bed in which this root lies, the soil
in which and out of which it thrives, spreads, and grows, is not
the rich soil of the garden, but the mud and slime of the ditch.
Yet, buried as it is in, and overwhelmed beneath this slimy bed,
the very region of coldness and death, it is utterly and entirely, in
its nature and essence, distinct from it. It is in the ditch, yet not
of it; surrounded with its slime, but uncontaminated with its filth;
ever in contact with its mire, but clean to the heart's core, and
without one particle of mud penetrating into its living tissues.

Such is the life of God in the soul; surrounded with all the mud
and mire of nature's corruption, yet not only distinct from it, but
uncontaminated by it; Did deadness mortify, did temptation
smother, did sin corrupt the pure, holy life of God in the soul,
long, long ago would it have dropped limb from limb, like the
gangrened body of a leper.

2. But secondly, in its first growth the seed pushes its infant
stem, its tender bud, through the mud and mire in which it finds
its root into the pure light and genial warmth of day. It does not,
like a stone, lie dead and motionless at the bottom of the ditch,
but presses onward and upward into a purer, brighter
atmosphere. So, in the first teachings of grace, does the infant
germ of divine life rear its head above the corruptions by which it
is surrounded. And, as the reed seeks the light of day, and
though flooded with water, and often buried by it, yet lifts up its
infant head to catch the warm vivifying beams of the sun; so the
life of God in the soul, though oft overborne by the swelling tides
of corruption, lifts up its infant head to catch the warm beams of
the Sun of righteousness.

What a blessed moment is that when grace first lifts up its head
above the slime of corruption and the waters of darkness! when
the green shoot is for the first time blown upon by the southern
breeze, and basks in the vivifying beams of spring! when after a
long struggle with the suffocating mire of sin, and the waves of
temptation and guilt, it emerges into day! What a start it then
makes in growth, and how it seems when the head is lifted up, to
have forgotten the mud and mire in which the root lies, as well as
the waves that once beat over its head!

Such is a young Christian, who, after many doubts, fears,

temptations, and exercises, is indulged with some manifestations
of the Lord's mercy and love! I compare sometimes young
Christians to hedge-rows in spring. How verdant they are; how
tender every leaf! how full of sap and juice every shoot! how
bright and refreshing the hawthorn blossom to the eye! And how,
when the rays of the sun play upon the green leaves, they reflect
its hues, and shine forth with transparent brightness!

But let a few weeks or months pass; let there be a long season of
drought; let the dust of the road settle in thick clouds upon the
leaves, ah! what a change! how fallen the flower! how shrivelled
up, how burnt and dried the branches! Yet is the change more
apparent than real; nay, a change for the better rather than the
worse. The hedge is stronger in autumn than it was in spring.
Though it looked then so beautiful, and every leaf and shoot were
so tender, there was little strength in it. But rain and storm, and
heat and drought, with revolving nights and days, have produced
an effect.

When winter comes, the wood is ripened; and though the leaves
are burnt and shrivelled, yet the hedge-row is all the stronger for
having experienced the midday heat and the midnight cold, the
summer sun and the autumn frost. So with the Christian. When
he has lived some years, gone through some storms, been dusted
over by the world, got burnt and blackened, like the bride (Song
1:6), by the sun of temptation, and been chilled by the cold of
desertion, he is ripened and matured. What he has lost in
comeliness he has gained in strength; and though the wintry
blast may howl through his branches, it does not break them off,
nor freeze them up as it would the immature juicy roots of spring.
Yes, after all, there is a strength in him, and a ripening, which the
young wood has not.

But to revert to our figure. Hitherto we have traced the progress

of our "reed," from the struggling of the germ beneath the mud
till the tender shoot emerges from the water. Having reached the
region of light, warmth, and air, it makes rapid progress. Every
ray of the sun draws it up day by day into more vigorous growth.

i.—But a change takes place. The text speaks of a "bruised

reed;" and the reed we have been considering is not yet bruised.
Nothing yet has taken place to bruise or crush it. The mud, it is
true, seemed to impede its progress, the depth of the water
prevented its emerging easily, and its infant head had sometimes
to buffet with the wave. But it grew up thus far without serious
injury. But now bruising comes. A Christian, then, must pass
through a certain experience in order to bring him into the
position spoken of in the text, and make him the character there
intimated, "a bruised reed." For what is a bruised reed? It is not a
broken reed; the head does not fall off, nor does it sink under
the water and die. But it is bruised.

Whence arises this experience? What makes a Christian "a

bruised reed?" Several things:

1. The holy Law of God. It is true, that usually the law is applied
to the conscience in the very first convictions of sin. But it is not
always so, or at least not with the same power. When did Paul
learn the experience contained in Rom. 7:9-11? Was it during the
three days at Damascus, or afterwards in the deserts of Arabia?
(Gal. 1:17) It would seem that his distress of soul at Damascus
arose chiefly from his having kicked against the pricks of
conscience in persecuting the saints. Stephen's murder lay heavy
on his soul. But in Arabia "the commandment came, and he
died;" and in those gloomy deserts, "sin taking occasion by the
law wrought in him all manner of concupiscence." There the law
bruised him. It bruised the holy Lamb of God; and, by bruising
the reed, bruises it into conformity to the suffering Man of
Sorrows in the garden and on the cross.

2. But Affliction also bruises. Let a Christian man pass through

much trouble in mind, family, body or circumstances; let him in
that trouble be denied the sweet presence of God; let trial upon
trial beat on his head, like wave after wave on the ocean shore. It
will bruise him. He will not have the strength of mind or body, the
light step, the cheerful countenance, the buoyant spirits that he
had before. Though it does not break him utterly, nor crush him
into despair, yet it bruises his spirit. And this is the purpose of
God in sending affliction. He means to bruise him thereby.

His own dear Son was bruised by grief and trouble, for he was a
"Man of Sorrows, and acquainted with grief." Grief and he were
not strangers; they were intimate acquaintances; and by grief
was he bruised, so as to be "a worm, and no man." This indeed
was "the affliction of the afflicted" (Ps. 22:4). Grief broke his
heart, bruised him into obedience and resignation to the will of
God; for "though he was a Son, yet learnt he obedience by the
things that he suffered." If, then, we are to have fellowship with
the Son of God in his sorrows, we must have our measure of the
same afflictions, that we may have some sympathy with the
broken-hearted Lord. Without this we can have neither union nor
communion with Him; for, as Hart says,

Union can be none

Betwixt a heart as soft as wax,
And hearts as hard as stone:
Betwixt a head diffusing blood,
And members sound and whole;
Betwixt an agonizing God, And an unfeeling soul.

We perhaps sometimes long after closer union and communion

with the Lord Jesus Christ, lament our distance from him, and the
alienation of our affections toward him. But do we ever think of
the way whereby we are to be brought near—that affliction is the
appointed path? That to enter into union and communion with a
broken-hearted Lord, we also must have broken hearts; that to
be brought into intimate relationship and acquaintance with the
Man of Sorrows, we too must have sorrows? We dare not, we
must not pray for affliction; that were too venturesome a prayer;
but if we pray for union with the Lord Jesus Christ, we are
indirectly praying for it. I would counsel no man to pray for
affliction. Young Christians have done so till the answer has made
them tremble. But if we pray for union with the Lord Jesus Christ,
we are really praying for a path of tribulation.

3. But Temptation also sadly bruises the "reed." There are few
things that bruise it more. But why should the "reed" be thus
bruised? Why should powerful and painful temptations fall upon it
to crush it? Because unbruised, it is too strong. It needs to be
taught, sensibly taught, its weakness; and there is nothing, I
believe, which makes us feel that weakness so much as an
acquaintance with temptation. Temptation brings to light the evils
of the heart. These are, for the most part, unnoticed and
unknown till temptation discovers them. David's adulterous,
murderous nature, Hezekiah's pride, Job's peevishness, Jonah's
rebellion. Peter's cowardice, all lay hid and concealed in their
bosoms till temptation drew them forth. Temptation did not put
them there, but found them there.

Our nature is the fuel to which temptation is the fire. But the
shavings lie harmless enough in the grate till the lucifer match
touches them. It is this ready-laid fuel that makes temptation so
dangerous. Well therefore is the prayer and the precept, "Lead us
not into temptation; Watch and pray, that ye enter not into
temptation." Were there in us no sin, we should be like Jesus,
when he said, "The Prince of this world cometh, and hath nothing
in me." But he hath everything in us; and therefore when
temptation is presented by him, it sets the carnal mind all on fire.
This grieves and distresses the new man of grace, bruises the
tender heart, and chafes and galls the conscience. But these
temptations also bruise our own strength, wisdom and
righteousness. Did not Job come out of his temptations with his
self-righteousness bruised? And what but this mallet crushed
David's pride, Hezekiah's ostentation, Jonah's rebellion, and
Peter's strength?

But when the reed is bruised, it impedes the flow of sap. So

under temptation and the guilt that it produces, there is less
flowing into the soul of the sensible presence and grace of God.
And this makes temptation doubly trying.

4. But Satan, especially, is permitted in God's wonderful

providence to bruise the "reed." It was declared in the first
promise, that "the seed of the woman should bruise the serpent's
head;" but it was added, that "the serpent should bruise his
heel." The very part that trod upon him the serpent was allowed
to bruise. And if he was allowed to bruise "the seed of the
woman," much more, much more may he bruise us. And bruise
us he will to some purpose. How the apostle Paul had a painful
experience of this! Satan, we read, buffeted him (2 Cor. 12:7).
The word "buffet" means to beat with the fist. Satan's assaults
are knock-down blows, not gentle taps. He strikes with the
strength and skill of the pugilist; his blows therefore stun.
Sometimes, for instance, he strikes us with an infidel suggestion.
How this stuns and confuses the mind! Sometimes with a
blasphemous insinuation. How this bruises the tender conscience!
Sometimes with enmity, rebellion, or despair. How these wound
and distress the feelings! But by these and similar temptations
two effects are produced:

1. Pride, strength, and self-righteousness are more or less

crushed.

2. The heart is bruised and made tender. Thus, as in the smitten

reed the outer coat and the inner pith are bruised by the same
blow, so in the exercised believer, the outer life and the inner life,
the outward rind of creature religion and the inward heart of vital
godliness, are bruised by the same trials and temptations.

5. But Sin, too—I mean the guilt of it, when laid on the
conscience—sadly bruises. You get entangled perhaps in a snare,
you are overtaken by some stratagem of Satan, or some
besetment from within. And what is the consequence? Guilt lies
hard and heavy upon your conscience. This bruises it, makes it
tender and sore, often cuts deeply into it till it bleeds at well-nigh
every pore.

6. God, too, not only indirectly and permissively through Satan

and temptation, but directly and immediately bruises the reed.
"Thine hand," cries the Psalmist, "presseth me sore." "Day and
night thy hand was heavy upon me." "Remove thy stroke from
me, I am consumed by the blow of thine hand." We read, too, of
Christ, that "it pleased the Lord to bruise him." And as he
bruises the Head, so he bruises the members. By his reproofs, his
frowns, his terrible majesty, his unspeakable holiness, he bruises
them into contrition before him.

Here, then, is the "bruised reed," drooping its head over the
water, ready to sink beneath the wave, and fall down into its
native corruption there to die. Is this bruised, tottering, trembling
thing the emblem of a Christian? blown by the wind, washed by
the wave, hanging over the stream only by the skin, sometimes
in and sometimes out as the gust swells or sinks? Who would
think that this was a Christian? Who would credit that this was
the way to prove experimentally the love and power of the
Saviour? Who would suppose, till taught of God, that this is the
way to get at right religion, true religion, a feeling knowledge of
the work of God upon the soul, an experimental acquaintance
with the Man of Sorrows, inward union and communion with the
Lord of life and glory? If we were called upon to choose a path,
this is the last we should think of. Our view would be this: every
day to get better and better, holier and holier, more and more
spiritual, and thus by degrees grow up into a deeper and closer
knowledge of Jesus Christ. But God has not appointed such a
way. His way is to make "strength perfect in weakness," and
therefore he makes a Christian feel himself "a bruised reed," that
in him his mighty power may be made known.

ii.—But the blessed Spirit, speaking of the Lord Jesus Christ and
his work, compares a tried Christian also to the "smoking flax."
The word "flax" here rather means what we call tow, that is,
the refuse of the hemp, or of the flax. This refuse it seems to
have been the custom to set on fire; and, as there was much dirt
and filth in it, the flame burnt in a very smouldering manner. This
smoking flax is the figure, then, that the Holy Spirit has employed
to set forth the life and work in a Christian's bosom. What is this
"flax?" Is it not the filth and corruptions of our evil nature, the
refuse, the scum, as it were, of the Adam fall? And what is the
fire that makes the smoke? Is it not the life of God within—that
fire which is kindled by a live coal from off the altar?

A Christian, then, is spoken of, not as breathing forth into a

bright and shining flame; but "as smoking flax," just so much of
the life of God in the soul as to make a smoke without much
flame or heat. Many, many of God's children are here; feeling,
deeply feeling their corruptions, and yet burning in the midst of
their heart, a fire, a blessed fire of God's own kindling. They
would, if they could, burst forth into a holy flame; they would not
have their eyes so continually annoyed with the smoke of their
own corruptions; they would flame up unto God in the sweet
breakings forth of faith, hope, and love. But their corruptions and
unbelief, their sin and shame, all seem to press down the life of
God in the soul. As in the smoking flax, the filth and refuse so
choke the fire that it smokes and smoulders, but cannot break
forth into a lively flame, so the filth and folly of our corrupt nature
seem to stifle the holy flame of grace in the soul.

What heaps of rubbish overspread the inward life of God! You

whose souls are exercised, do not you find how family cares,
occupation in business, crowds of foolish and worldly thoughts,
sinful and sensual desires, and a whole dust-bin of vain, idle
imaginations, all suffocate the flame that is struggling upwards.
Thus days and weeks are spent in a dying life, and a living death.
The fire neither goes out, nor burns up. Sometimes the smoke
rises up thicker and higher; sometimes it dies away so as
scarcely to be seen: and sometimes a passing breeze wafts it up
into a transient flame. But its general character is to smoulder.
Where there is this in the soul, there is life. There is a struggle
now against corruption, as the fire in the midst of the smoking
flax struggles against the refuse by which it is surrounded; but,
alas! it wants a vigorous breath to make it brightly glow; it wants
the south wind from the mountains of spices to burn through the
superincumbent mass of corruption, and mount up like the flame
in which the angel of the Lord ascended when Manoah and his
wife looked on. But there is life where there is even smoke.
Where it merely smoulders and smoulders, there is fire. It is not
merely a heap of dead refuse; there is a holy fire beneath that
causes the flax to smoke.

Such is very much the experience of the day. Things are low for
the most part in Zion. Take almost any Christian, and you will
find that he is at best but a "smoking flax;" and especially
perhaps in London. I do believe in my very conscience there is
more real religion in the country than in London—more feeling in
the heart, more life in the soul. The people are less cumbered
with worldly anxieties, and less overborne by the broad, deep,
rapid stream of carnality. But Zion, generally, in town or country,
is in a low place; the flax is smoking, and that is all. There is
enough fire to shew that the life of God is within, and yet not
enough to break forth into a glowing flame.

II.—But we pass on to consider how the blessed Redeemer "will

not break" the "bruised reed," nor "quench" the "smoking flax."
"He knoweth our frame; he remembereth that we are dust."
Here, then, is a "bruised reed," a poor child of God, ready to give
up all hope, to sink beneath the wave no more to rise, expecting
that the next blow will sever the stem, or suffocate and bury him
in his native mire and mud.
But O how graciously, how tenderly and gently does the
Redeemer deal with this timid, tried member of his mystical
body! He deals with him neither according to his merits nor his
fears. The "bruised reed" deserves to be broken again and again;
and it fears it because it deserves it. But the gracious, tender-
hearted Redeemer, so far from breaking gently binds. And how
he can in a moment bind up the "bruised reed!" By one word, one
look, one touch, one smile, he can in a moment rear up the
drooping head. This is his blessed office. The disciples would have
broken the bruised Syrophenician woman, when they said, "Send
her away, for she crieth after us." But not so their heavenly
Master. He dealt not so with her. His holiness, his purity, his
hatred of sin, his zeal for the glory of his Father, would indeed all
lead him to break; but his mercy, grace, compassion, and love,
all lead him to bind.

You may perhaps feel yourself a poor "bruised reed"—bruised by

afflictions, by temptations, by guilt, by Satan, ready to perish, to
give up all hope, and droop away and die. O remember—the Lord
give us ever to remember—that this blessed Man of Sorrows "was
in all points tempted like as we are, yet without sin." "Being
touched with the feeling of our infirmities," he can sympathize
and succour, and therefore will never, no, never break a "bruised
reed." If our poor soul is bruised by affliction, by temptation, by
doubt and fear, by Satan's suggestions, be it known for our
comfort and encouragement, that the condescending and tender-
hearted Redeemer will never, no, never break that "bruised
reed," but will most graciously, in his own time and way, bind it
up.

"The smoking flax," it is said also of Him, that "he will not
quench." O what does the "smoking flax" not deserve! Does it not
merit that the foot of God should stamp it out? When you think
for a moment how filthy and abominable your corruptions are;
how strong and powerful your lusts and passions; how many and
grievous your slips and falls; how carnal your mind; how cold and
lifeless too often your frame; how wandering your prayers; how
worldly your inclinations; how earthly and sensual your desires—
is it not sometimes a wonder to you, that the Almighty God does
not in righteous wrath put his foot upon you and crush you into
hell, as we crush a spider? We deserve it every day that we live. I
might almost say, that with well-nigh every breath that we draw
we deserve, deeply deserve, to be stamped out of life, and
crushed into a never-ending hell. But herein is manifested the
tender condescending mercy and grace of the compassionate
Redeemer, that "he will not quench the smoking flax," but will
keep the flame alive which he himself so mercifully in the first
instance kindled. The hand that brought the spark must keep
alive the flame; for as no man can quicken, so no man can keep
alive his own soul.

How it is kept alive is indeed most mysterious; but kept alive it is.
Does it not sometimes seem to you as though you had no life of
God in your soul, not a spark of grace in your heart? Where is
your religion? where is your faith and hope and love? Where your
spirituality and tenderness of heart, conscience, and affections?
where your breathings after God? Gone, gone, gone! And gone all
would be utterly, irrecoverably, if it were in your own hands, and
consigned to your own keeping. But it is in better hands and
better keeping than yours, "Because I live, ye shall live also." "He
that believeth on me hath everlasting life, and shall never come
into condemnation but is passed from death unto life." "My sheep
shall never perish, and none shall pluck them out of my hand."
Christ is our life; it is hid with him in God.
And thus it comes to pass, that the "smoking flax" is never
quenched. O how quickly would Satan throw water upon it! He
would soon, if permitted, pour forth the flood of his temptations,
as he is said to do against the church in the wilderness (Rev.
12:15), to extinguish the holy flame that smoulders within. How
sin, too, again and again pours forth a whole flood of corruption
to overcome and extinguish the life of God in the soul! The world,
too, without, and the worse world within, would soon drown it in
his destruction and perdition, were the Lord to keep back his
protecting hand. But he revives his own work.

Have you not wondered sometimes that when you have been so
cold, dead, stupid, hardened, as if you had not one spark of true
religion or one grain of real grace, yet all of a sudden you have
found your heart softened, melted, moved, stirred, watered, and
blest, and you have felt an inward persuasion that in spite of all
your corruptions and sins and sorrows there is the life of God
within. It is thus that the blessed Lord keeps alive the holy flame
which he himself has kindled. It would soon else go out; nay, it
must go out, unless he keep it alive.

The very dust and dirt of the tow would suffocate it, unless he
again and again stirred it up and kept it smouldering in the soul.
The very words, that "he will not quench it," connected with what
is afterwards said, shew that he will one day make it burst forth,
for he keeps it smouldering on till it flames out. And when it
bursts forth into a holy flame, it burns up the corruptions,
devours them, swallows them up, and suffers not one to live.

Let the Lord sweetly bless the soul; let the holy flame of his love
and grace burn in the heart; this flame, like the fire that fell down
from heaven in the days of Elijah, licks up all the waters in the
trench, and consumes, whilst it lasts, the filth and corruption
whereby it was surrounded. But alas, alas! it soon gathers again.
The cares of business, the things of time and sense, an evil heart,
a defiled imagination, soon gather together the dust and refuse;
and then it has to go on smoking and smouldering as before. It
cannot, no, it cannot of itself break forth into a holy flame. But it
will one day burn brightly in a blessed eternity, when there shall
be no refuse of sin and corruption to stifle the ever-mounting
flame of praise, adoration, and love.

III.—But we pass on to our third and last point—What the Lord

will eventually do, and what he will never desist from till he
has completely done. This last clause seems to cast a gleam of
light upon the whole of the preceding, "Till he send forth
judgment unto victory." Whilst the reed is being "bruised," and
whilst the flax is "dimly burning" as we read in the margin, or
smouldering, "judgment" is going on; that is, the court of
judgment is set up in the conscience, and verdicts are passing
against the soul. Wherever there is the life of God within, there
will be a bar at which and before which the soul will be
arraigned—the bar of a tender conscience. God's Vicegerent, the
blessed Spirit, sits there, and with the word of God in his hands
and its spiritual application in his lips, he summons the soul to
stand before him.

Do you not find something of this going on daily? You speak a

word amiss; does not the Vicegerent bring you to the bar, and
condemn you for it? There is a rising up or breaking forth of
unseemly temper. The father or the mother, the master or the
mistress, gives vent to some ebullition of anger, mastered,
overmastered by the impetuosity of natural temper. Does the
Vicegerent of God pass this by, and take no notice? He brings up
the delinquent, summons him to the bar, condemns him, and
casts him. Or there may be a word spoken in business which is
not the strict truth. You would not, you cannot, must not tell a
lie; but still there is something not very, not very unlike it. There
are these goods to be recommended, or this customer not to be
turned away; and by some little delicate manoeuvring the whole
affair is managed very nicely, as a Regent Street tradesman
would say. No lie has been told, but a little equivocation has been
practised. Ah! where is conscience? The Vicegerent has seen all,
marked all, and now brings the criminal to feel and confess all.
Or the eye has been wandering and lusting after some evil thing,
or, not to particularize too minutely, in some way or other sin and
temptation have got the better of you. Is God's Vicegerent dumb?
Does Mr. Recorder as Bunyan calls him keep silence? No; he
speaks, and loudly too; and when he speaks, all the city
trembles. During this time as the reed is bruised with these
exercises, and the flax smoulders amidst these temptations,
judgment is going on, condemnation is felt; there is guilt of
conscience, a writing of bitter things against one's self, with a
whole host of doubts and fears for, as Hart most truly says,

"Sin engenders doubt."

It is our slipping and being overcome by temptation which opens

a way for a whole army of doubts and fears to push in through
the breach. Were the sentry duly on guard, were the soldiers on
the battlements pointing their artillery heavenwards, and, above
all, were the great Captain of their salvation at their head, no
enemy would dare to attack. But when the sentry is asleep, the
artillery silenced, the Captain gone, and a breach made, a whole
troop pours in from the black camp to storm and plunder the city.

But, to revert to the figure of our text: O how tenderly is the

blessed Lord watching all this time! Here is a "bruised reed,"
bruised by the law, sin, Satan, sorrow, and temptation; without
strength, ready to sink and die. Jesus does not, as he might
justly do, crush it with a blast of his awful displeasure. Again:
Here is a "smoking flax" who deserves a thousand times a day to
be stamped under foot. But the gracious Man of Sorrows "will
never break the bruised reed, nor quench the smoking flax." It is
true, that "he sends forth judgment," for he means to bring the
soul down into the dust; but whilst this judgment is going on, he
secretly supports; for he kills that he may make alive; he brings
down to the grave that he may bring up. But in sending forth this
"judgment," it is "unto victory." Conquest is at the end; victory is
sure. There may be a long conflict; a hard and fearful battle, with
the garments rolled in sweat and blood; but victory is sure at
last. For he will never rest till he fully gains the day.
O how Satan would triumph if any saint ever fell out of the
embraces of the good Shepherd; if he could point his derisive
finger up to heaven's gate and to its risen King, and say, 'Thy
blood was shed in vain for this wretch; he is mine, he is mine!'
Such a boast would fill hell with a yell of triumph. But no, no; it
never will be so; the "blood that cleanseth from all sin" never
was, never can be shed in vain. Though the reed is "bruised," it
will never be broken; though the flax "smokes," it will never be
extinguished; for He that "sends forth judgment" sends it "unto
victory."

Long indeed may the battle fluctuate; again and again may the
enemy charge; again and again may the event seem doubtful.
Victory may be delayed even unto a late hour, till evening is
drawing on and the shades of night are about to fall; but it is sure
at last. And it is the Lord that does the whole. We have no power
to turn the battle to the gate. Is there one temptation that you
can master? Is there any one sin that you can, without divine
help, crucify? one lust that you can, without special grace,
subdue? We are perfect weakness in this matter. But the blessed
Lord makes his strength perfect in this weakness. We may and
indeed must be bruised, and under painful feelings may think no
one was so hardly dealt with, and that our case is singular. But
without this we should not judge ourselves; and "if we judge
ourselves, we shall not be judged of the Lord." If you justify
yourself, the Lord will condemn you; if you condemn yourself, the
Lord will justify you. Exalt yourself, and the Lord will humble you;
humble yourself, and the Lord will exalt you.

This ought to encourage every one that feels bruised in spirit, and
to smoke and smoulder. I do not mean to say, I can give the
encouragement; I am not the man to say that either I can give,
or that you can take it. But if you are the character here pointed
out, all your questionings of what the Lord has done, or what he
will do, does not alter the case. Questionings do not make Jesus
not to be Jesus; they do not make the word of God not to be the
word of the most High. "If we believe not, he abideth faithful; he
cannot deny himself."

You, as a "bruised reed," may write a thousand bitter things

against yourself; you, as a "smoking flax," may fear there is no
life of God in your soul. But Jesus, if he has made you a "bruised
reed," or "smoking flax," will carry on his own work; for we read,
in connection with the very passage in the prophet Isaiah, "He
shall not fail, nor be discouraged, till he have set judgment in the
earth; and the isles shall wait for his law" (Isa. 42:4). The words
are remarkable. They shew that he has, so to speak, amazing
difficulties to encounter. But he will not fail in what he has
undertaken; he will not be discouraged by all the opposition he
may meet with, till he has accomplished his holy purpose. For it is
"his own right arm which hath gotten him the victory." Ever bear
in mind, that as the Lord said of old, "I do not this for your sakes,
O house of Israel, but for mine holy name's sake;" so it is not for
your sake, base, poor, and vile sinners, but for his own name's
sake, truth's sake, word's sake, and eternal honour and glory's
sake that he "sends forth judgment unto victory!"

What a mercy it is that the fulfilment of the Lord's promise

depends upon his own veracity; that it does not depend upon our
feelings; no, nor upon our experience, but upon his own veracity:
"Hath he said, and will he not do it?" And therefore here is
ground for hope and faith, not in ourselves who are always poor,
weak, miserable creatures, but in the Lord's mercy, goodness,
and truth. The foundation of our trust is in the character of the
Son of God, that he is what he is, a blessed Jesus, able to save to
the uttermost all that come unto God by him. He who puts his
trust in Him will never be confounded; he that hopes through
grace in his mercy will never be put to shame; and he that
believes in Him will surely reap the end of his faith, even the
salvation of his soul.
CALLED UNTO DIVINE FELLOWSHIP

Preached at Providence Chapel, Oakham, Lord's Day Afternoon,

9th November, 1845

"God is faithful, by whom ye were called unto the fellowship of his

Son Jesus Christ our Lord." 1 Cor.1:9

Everything in this world is changing and changeable. We

ourselves are perpetually fluctuating and wavering. The things of
time and sense are as fluctuating and wavering as we. Our
friends are fluctuating and wavering too. All things are in a
continual state of transition and change. Seeing, then, that all
earthly things are passing away, and the things of time and sense
vanishing like a cloud of the night, the Scripture leads us to rest
upon something that is immutable and unchangeable, a
foundation to stand upon which shall not waver and fluctuate with
earthly, perishing things. For instance, Jesus Christ is held forth
as "the same yesterday, and to day, and for ever " (Heb.13:8),
and therefore a foundation on which to stand for eternity. Again,
we read that "every good gift and every perfect gift is from
above, and cometh down from the Father of lights, with whom is
no variableness, neither shadow of turning" (Jas.1:17). In these
passages the unchangeableness and immutability of God are held
forth as a foundation for our wavering, halting feet to stand upon.

In the same way the text holds forth the faithfulness and
unchangeableness of Jehovah. "God is faithful, by whom ye were
called unto the fellowship of his Son Jesus Christ our Lord." The
faithfulness of God to his Word and to his work is here pointed
out as a foundation on which to rest. Now, unless a man rest
upon this, he is continually wavering. Until he is brought to
anchor in immutability, he is perpetually tossed up and down with
every wind and wave of doctrine; but when he is brought to rest
on things which cannot change, then he has an anchor to his soul
"both sure and steadfast, and which entereth into that within the
veil" (Heb.6:19).
There are two things worthy of notice in the text:

I. One is the declaration of God's faithfulness: "God is faithful;"

and, II. What God does in order to manifest his faithfulness: "By
whom ye were called unto the fellowship of his Son Jesus Christ
our Lord." In considering these words I shall, with God's blessing,
change their order, and look first at what is contained in the
words, "By whom ye were called unto the fellowship of his Son
Jesus Christ our Lord." And then, secondly, at God's faithfulness
and unchangeability as made manifest in this special calling.

I. All God's purposes run underground until they are manifested

and brought forth; for his way is in the sea, and his path in the
great waters, and his footsteps are not known (Psa.77:19). "It is
the glory of God," we read, "to conceal a thing " (Prov.25:2).
Thus God has hidden his own eternal counsels in his own bosom,
and they are only brought forth in time in such a way and such a
season as he has appointed. We have a wonderful instance of this
in the crucifixion of the Lord of life and glory. It was the eternal
purpose of the Three-One Jehovah that the Son of God should
die, and by dying offer up a ransom price to save the elect from
the ruins of the fall. This lay hid in the bosom of God. When the
Lord Jesus came into the world, he came for that special purpose;
but it was hidden from the eyes of man, hidden from the eyes of
his disciples, and hidden from the eyes of the Jews. Now, so it is
with respect to the work of grace upon the soul. What is God's
purpose in beginning and carrying on a work of grace in the soul?
It is set forth in the text, "By whom ye were called unto the
fellowship of his Son Jesus Christ our Lord." That is the object;
that is the purpose of the work of grace upon the soul, to call
God's people unto a fellowship with the Son of God; to bring
them into living union and communion with the Lord of life and
glory. Now this work must go on; for "God is faithful." It must go
on until it result in the accomplishment of what God has
purposed.

Let me explain myself a little more fully. Say (for example), you
are a vessel of mercy, that God has chosen you in Christ from
before the foundation of the world, and has loved you with an
everlasting love in the Person of his dear Son. Jesus came and
laid down his life for you. He died on the cross that you might live
for ever. He bore your sins in his own body on the tree. He
reconciled you to God, and cast all your transgressions into the
depths of the sea. Now, the object in calling you by his grace, is
to bring you into the fellowship of his dear Son.

But when a work of grace is first begun upon the heart, the
subject of it is not aware what God's purposes are. The Lord does
not reveal them; nay, rather, he hides them from his eyes. His
purpose is to bring the soul into the personal knowledge, spiritual
enjoyment of, and divine communion with his own dear Son. But
where does he find us? He finds us in what I sometimes call a
sensual communion; that is, a fellowship with sensible objects.
The fellowship and communion that we are to enjoy, if called by
grace, is a spiritual communion with invisible, insensible objects.
But the Lord finds us in a state of nature, having communion with
sensible objects, buried in a sensual, as distinct from a spiritual
communion. We are imbued with a spirit of the world, the things
of time and sense are our element, the world is our home, and
we are so swallowed up in it that we have no other object,
delight, or purpose. This I call a sensual communion; that is,
there is a fellowship, an intimacy, and intercourse in our carnal
mind with sin, the world, and all that is evil. But this intimacy and
intercourse must be broken up, that spiritual communion with the
Lord of life and glory may be set up in its place. Our communion
with the world, with everything short of Christ, is all to be broken
in pieces, that we may be led up into union and communion with
Jesus. For instance, we have in our carnal state communion with
sin, we have an intimacy with it, it is our bosom companion. It is
like the lamb in the parable of Nathan; it lies in our bosom, drinks
of our cup, and is to us as a daughter. We fondle it as a parent
does a child, we cleave to it in love. Thus there is a sensual
intercourse with sin and all its baseness and filth. This, then, is to
be broken.
But what is to break it? The entrance of God's holy
commandment so as to manifest his purity, and holiness, and
righteous anger against sin; and this breaks to pieces that
sensual communion which we have with iniquity. This is the first
thing God uses, his holy commandment, his pure precept, the
spirituality of his law opened up in the soul. Sin is then
discovered to be sin, its evil nature is then manifested, the wrath
of God is revealed against it, and the wages of sin, which is
eternal death, are brought to light. The soul is thus cut off and
cut away from sin by the sharp entrance of that sword which the
apostle speaks of, "For the word of God is quick, and powerful,
and sharper than any twoedged sword" (Heb.4:12). The sharp
Word of God entering into the conscience cuts asunder the former
communion betwixt the soul and sin.

But there is also communion with the world. We love the world by
nature, our heart is in it, our affections are altogether worldly, all
that our natural heart delights in is sublunary, earthly. This
sensual communion, then, with the world must be broken to
pieces; we must be divorced from it in order that we may have
communion with holy and heavenly things. When God makes
himself known as a consuming fire, and the breadth and
spirituality of the precepts are opened up, the world is seen as
the apostle saw it, lying in wickedness, or in the wicked one (1
John 5:19), and all but God's people are beheld as walking in the
broad road that leads to eternal perdition. We thus become
separated from it, and our feet are turned out of the broad into
the narrow way. The Holy Spirit sets the face towards the
heavenly Jerusalem; and thus our communion with the world is
broken to pieces.

But there is also communion with our own righteousness. There is

a delighting in what we think we have done or can do for the
Lord. Our freewill, our natural strength, our creature piety, our
fleshly religion, cleave closely to us; we have a sensual union
with them all. Now this likewise must be broken to pieces, or else
we cannot have communion with the Lord of life and glory. And
this too begins to be destroyed by the entrance of the precept of
God's Word, by the spirituality of God's law; our own
righteousness is made known to us as filthy rags, and we abhor
and loathe ourselves in dust and ashes as the vilest of the vile.
And so also there is a sensual communion with deceit, hypocrisy,
and delusion; for the heart is "deceitful above all things, and
desperately wicked" (Jer.17:9), and out of this wicked heart there
springs a wicked intimacy with all manner of lies, hypocrisy,
deceit, and delusion. By nature we drink down lies like water, our
hypocritical heart wallows in hypocrisy as the swine on a hot
summer's day wallows in the mud; to deceive ourselves and
others is the very element of our deceitful heart. This intercourse,
then, with lies, hypocrisy, and delusion, must all be cut asunder
by the entrance of the light of God's Word into the soul.

When a pure and holy God shines forth into the conscience, our
hypocrisy, lies, and delusion are made manifest, and our
intercourse with them begins to be dissolved. If you read Isaiah
28, you will see how the Lord speaks there of breaking up this
sensual communion: "Because ye have said, We have made a
covenant with death, and with hell are we at agreement; when
the overflowing scourge shall pass through, it shall not come unto
us: for we have made lies our refuge, and under falsehood have
we hid ourselves: Therefore thus saith the Lord GOD, Behold, I
lay in Zion for a foundation a stone, a tried stone, a precious
corner stone, a sure foundation: he that believeth shall not make
haste. Judgment also will I lay to the line, and righteousness to
the plummet: and the hail shall sweep away the refuge of lies,
and the waters shall overflow the hiding place" (verses 15-17).
This covenant with death and agreement with hell is a
communion and intercourse with death and hell; and this is
broken up by the hail sweeping away the refuges of lies, and the
waters overflowing the hiding-place.

Only, therefore, as this covenant with death and agreement with

hell, that is, this sensual communion, is broken to pieces, can
there be spiritual communion with the Lord of life and glory. Now,
in this God's people are distinguished from all others on the face
of the earth, in that they are seeking communion with the Son of
God, fellowship with Jesus in the knowledge and enjoyment of
him in their hearts. This distinguishes a work of grace upon the
heart from all fleshly counterfeits.

Now as the Lord breaks up this sensual communion, he goes on

to fulfil his own eternal purpose; which is, to bring a soul into
communion with his dear Son. Observe the words of the text, "By
whom ye were called unto the fellowship of his Son Jesus Christ."
It is God therefore who calls his people unto "the fellowship of his
Son Jesus Christ." Now he has lodged in his dear Son everything
needful for our wants. "For it pleased the Father that in him
should all fulness dwell" (Col.1:19). And again we read, "And of
his fulness have all we received, and grace for grace" (John
1:16). We read also, "In him dwelleth all the fulness of the
Godhead bodily" (Col.2:9). The Lord of life and glory is the
brightness of the Father's glory and the express image of his
Person. All that God is shines forth in the face of Jesus Christ. In
bringing, therefore, his people into fellowship with his dear Son,
he brings them into fellowship with the Three-One God. God out
of Christ is a consuming fire. None can see him and live. God is
invisible. He is said to "dwell in thick darkness" (1 Kings 8:12),
and also "in the light which no man can approach unto" (1
Tim.6:16). But if we have not fellowship with God we shall one
day be of all men most miserable. And the way to have fellowship
with God is to have fellowship with his Son; for he is the
Mediator. He stands betwixt God and us; through him we have
access to God, by him we are reconciled to God, and thus by him
we have fellowship and communion with a Three-One Jehovah.
Oh, what a mercy it is to have a Mediator to cover with blood and
righteousness the guilty head of a fallen child of Adam! Not to
have to deal immediately with God as a consuming fire, whose
infinite holiness and eternal justice must consume us; but that
there is a Mediator, one who has taken the flesh and blood of the
children into union with his glorious Person, a Daysman through
whom we may have access to God, one who has said, "I am the
way, the truth, and the life: no man cometh unto the Father but
by me" (John 14:6). The grand object of divine teaching in the
soul is to bring us to Jesus. What says the Lord himself? "It is
written in the prophets, And they shall be all taught of God. Every
man therefore that hath heard, and hath learned of the Father,
cometh unto me" (John 6:45). That is the effect of divine
teaching, a coming unto Jesus. As the text says, "By whom ye
were called unto the fellowship of his Son."

Now, every obstacle that interferes with or prevents this

fellowship, God will remove. That is the reason why we have so
many trials, so many sharp thorns, so many bitter afflictions,
such painful exercises, such distressing temptations. They are to
encourage communion with Jesus by removing out of the way all
that is in opposition to it. For instance, there is the world; when
this creeps in, it shuts out fellowship with the Lord Jesus. It has
therefore to be removed; and is done by means of painful trials.
Again, there is carnality, lightness, frivolity, worldly-mindedness;
to all of which we are sadly prone. Now when these evils get
possession of us, they shut out communion with Jesus. Therefore
we need scourging with sharp thorns and briers, as the men of
Succoth were torn by the thorns and briers of the wilderness
(Judges 8:7,16), that this carnality and lightness may be torn
away out of the heart. So afflictions in body, in providence, in the
family, temptations from Satan, the burden of an evil heart of
unbelief, the corruption that we are more or less plagued with, all
these things are made profitable, in order to bring us into
fellowship with God's dear Son by emptying us of self. God's dear
Son is only suitable for sinners; all that he is and has is for such;
all his glorious fulness, all his precious attributes, all his dying
love, all the riches of his atoning blood, the beauty and glory of
his justifying righteousness, all are for sinners, for feeling,
sensible, sin-plagued, Satan-harassed sinners. As, then, we sink
into felt sinnership, it leads us up into communion with Jesus.
Pride, worldly-mindedness, covetousness, self-righteousness,
self-esteem, self-exaltation, carnality, and lightness, all unfit a
man for communion with Christ.
Jesus is a brokenhearted Lord, the Spirit of God was given him
without measure, his heart is full of tenderness, sympathy, and
compassion, he is a holy Jesus; therefore there can be no
communion on his part with sin. For "what concord hath Christ
with Belial?" (2 Cor.6:15). What intercourse can there be, then,
on the part of Christ with sin which he hates, with the world that
crucified him, with Satan his implacable enemy, with that evil
heart in man that is utterly opposed to his holy and pure nature?
In order, therefore, to bring us into fellowship with Jesus, we
need trials, exercises, afflictions, and temptations, to remove out
of the way those things that hinder communion, and to bring us
down to lie as low as possible in our own eyes. This fits us for
Jesus. But it may be asked, "When are we fit for Jesus?" When
we are all nakedness, all rags, all misery, all guilt, and all
helplessness, and sink down at his feet unworthy of a single smile
from his face, then we are fit for him. We are unfit for him when
we are proud and covetous, when we have no sorrows, nor
burdens, nor griefs, nor troubles, when sin does not lie on the
conscience, when we can be cheerful and happy with the things
of time and sense. All these things set us at a distance from
Christ. But sorrows, griefs, burdens, exercises, doubts, cares,
perplexities, and distresses, these are helps that God uses to
bring us to Jesus. One is the ebbing wave that takes us away
from the rock, and the other is the flowing wave that drives us on
to it. One is the adverse wind that blows against the ship when
she is making for the harbour, the other is the prosperous gale
that urges her forward into the haven. So that the things that
seem against us are really for us; and the things that seem for us
are really against us.

But what is communion and "fellowship with his Son Jesus Christ
our Lord?" It is a sweet and blessed intimacy betwixt Jesus and
the soul. How is this produced? It is produced by the Spirit
through the Word; not by the Spirit without the Word, but by the
Spirit of God making use of the Word as the living instrument to
raise up faith in the soul, whereby through the Word are
communicated power, unction, and sweetness to the conscience.
If ever you have felt anything like fellowship, communion with
God's dear Son, it has been in this way: the Spirit of God worked
through the Scriptures upon your heart, secretly applying to your
soul some precious truth concerning Jesus, giving you faith to
receive it in simplicity and love, and then drawing your heart
upward through the Word into the presence of him who sits and
reigns behind the veil. This is communion with God's dear Son,
what the Scripture calls the "communion of the Holy Ghost" (2
Cor.13:14); because the Holy Ghost alone can lead us up into
this fellowship. Now this is what God calls his people to, this is
what God makes all his people intensely long for.

The Lord's people are all dissatisfied with everything short of

communion with God's dear Son. Give them the doctrines of truth
without the Spirit's sealing these truths upon their hearts, they
bring no sweet communion. They cannot, therefore, rest upon
them. Give them their own righteousness, it produces no
communion with the Lord. Let them have the world, it does not
lead their soul into communion with him. Give them sin, it draws
them away from the Lord. Let them fall into darkness, and be
beset with fears, doubts, perplexities, and temptations, these
bring them no communion with the Lord. What they want, then,
is that Jesus would sweetly whisper into their souls: Thou art
mine; fear not, I have redeemed thee. "Behold, I have graven
thee upon the palms of my hands; thy walls are continually
before me" (Isa.49:16). Thus to have our souls raised up into the
very bosom of the Lord, so as to clasp him and embrace him in
the arms of affection and love, as a lover breathes his love-tale
into the ears of his beloved one, that we may be able to say,
"Whom have I in heaven but thee? and there is none upon earth
that I desire beside thee" (Psa.73:25), this alone satisfies a living
soul. Now when a soul has enjoyed a measure of this, then it has
enjoyed what God has called it to, the "fellowship of his Son Jesus
Christ our Lord." This is the life of religion.

But if we have fellowship with the Son, it will bring into our hearts
every fruit and grace of the Spirit. Jesus has left us an example
that we should walk in his steps, and the Scripture sets forth his
holy love, his humility of spirit, his meekness, his gentleness, his
separation from the world, the image of God shining forth in him.
Now when God calls us into the fellowship of his dear Son, it is
that we may walk in his steps, it is that the image and likeness of
Jesus may be impressed upon our souls. It is that we may be
conformed to the image of the Firstborn, and that the mind and
likeness of the blessed Lord may be stamped upon our hearts,
lips, and lives. If we are not called to this, we are called to
nothing.

II. But the text adds, and it is a great mercy that it is added,
"God is faithful." For consider how many things there are to
interrupt this fellowship. What an evil nature you carry in your
bosom, which is averse to communion with this blessed Lord!
How many enemies surround your soul! What an adversary you
have by night and by day to grapple with! But "God is faithful."
Do you see the connection? As though the Holy Spirit implied
this: God has called you unto the fellowship of his Son. That is his
object; and he is faithful. His purposes are immutable. He hath
purposed, and shall he not accomplish his purpose? He is faithful,
and has determined you shall enjoy that fellowship unto which he
hath called you. Now this, by setting forth God's eternal will and
pleasure, shows that in us there is everything against that
fellowship, and that God's faithfulness alone overcomes that evil
tendency, perfects and completes his purposes. For instance, our
carnal mind is altogether opposed to communion with the Son of
God. What is the scriptural description of it? It is summed up in
one expression: "The carnal mind is enmity against God: for it is
not subject to the law of God, neither indeed can be " (Rom.8:7).
If that be the case, can there be any fellowship or communion in
our carnal mind with God? If it is enmity against him? If it is not
subject to the law of God? If it is opposed to all his will, and
Word, and ways? Can there be any union between our carnal
mind and God's dear Son? Impossible! Now just in proportion as
our natural mind works, will there be a turning away from
communion with Jesus, a plunging into communion with the world
and the world's sins, a cleaving to the things of time and sense,
as riches, honour, pride, and worldly pleasures. Our carnal mind
understands all these things; it is the very breath that it draws
into its lungs, the very element in which it swims. Its whole being
is intense, implacable enmity to God and his dear Son, and
therefore can never be reconciled to him. But God is a pure and
holy God, and must ever regard sin with the utmost hatred and
abhorrence. Do we not feel it? What is the greatest grief and
burden to a living soul? Is it not the workings of his natural mind?
Does not this wicked mind continually stir up unbelief, infidelity,
rebellion, and fretfulness? Does it not drag him into the world?
Does it not draw him away from the Lord? Does it not fill him with
everything base, earthly, sensual, and devilish? But "God is
faithful." And he will not suffer the carnal mind to overcome a
believer. God, being faithful, has called his people unto the
fellowship of his dear Son: he therefore communicates power to
the soul whereby this carnal mind is overcome. There are times
and seasons when it is blessedly overcome. When sharp exercises
and troubles work with power in the mind for a time, the Lord at
such seasons communicates a sweet spirit of faith. And where
this spirit of faith is, it goes up after the living Lord. And thus
"God is faithful," who will not suffer the carnal mind to prevail
altogether, but gives his blessed Spirit to draw the heart up to
him.

Then there is the world, and the world is opposed to communion

with God's dear Son. It calls it rank enthusiasm, a bitter spirit; it
is horrible in the eyes of the profane world. What! To have
communion with Jesus; there is nothing that they scorn more,
nothing from which the world more revolts. And the world in our
hearts is just as bad. The news and gossip, politics, the chit- chat
of the day, and the scandal of the town, the carnal mind has
plenty of communion with that; it drinks it all down as a thirsty
ox drinks down water; but the world outward and the world
inward never can have communion with Jesus. He is too holy, too
heavenly for the world or for our worldly heart to love. Therefore
we need crosses, losses, trials, temptations, and exercises. These
embitter the world, they show us the world cannot satisfy us. And
then the Lord takes occasion to drop a measure of divine
sweetness into the heart, and gives it that solid satisfaction in
Jesus which the world can neither give nor take away. Thus "God
is faithful."

Then there is temptation. There is constant temptation in a living

soul, and these temptations are all against communion. Have you
not had all sorts of evil thoughts injected into your mind against
Jesus? Nothing too bad to think about him, nothing too base,
nothing too horrible. And what was the object of it all but to
harass your soul, distract your mind, and destroy communion
with the Son of God? And if God were not faithful, these
temptations would do it effectually. But "God is faithful." He has
not allowed you to be tempted more than you can bear. When
enemies come in like a flood, the Spirit of God holds up the
standard against them, and brings that faith into your soul
whereby Jesus is looked up to, rested upon, and loved, in spite of
all these suggestions against him with which the devil fills your
heart. Be not surprised if you find in your heart everything
whispered against the Son of God. Satan hates him with mortal
enmity, and your mind is enmity against him. It is the lot of God's
children thus to be tempted; but "God is faithful." He will not let
you be overcome. He will in time subdue and conquer these
temptations, and bring your soul into fellowship with his dear
Son. Sometimes despair works powerfully, and despondency
suggests that you have committed such sins as God cannot
forgive; and when you give way to this temptation it hinders
communion, it shuts up prayer, stops the reading of the Word,
and seals up the spirit of supplication within. Then there are
doubts and fears, perplexities, harassings of Satan as to the work
of grace upon the heart, whether we have felt right, begun right,
and continued right. All these various workings in the mind hinder
communion with God's dear Son. But "God is faithful, by whom
ye were called unto the fellowship of his Son." God's purpose in
calling you is not to build up your own righteousness, not to make
you think anything of yourself, not to set you to work, nor make
you in love with what you think you can do. He has but one
purpose in view, and that is, to bring your soul into sweet
communion with his dear Son, to stamp his likeness upon you,
and to fill your soul with joy and peace in believing, "joy
unspeakable and full of glory" (1 Pet.1:8).

Now, how is this to be attained? Not by looking into our own

hearts to find anything good there. But in a spirit of faith, by
looking up to Jesus, resting upon his blood and righteousness,
and receiving a communication out of his fulness. If you are a
poor, needy sinner, if you are a guilty criminal, a brokenhearted
wretch, if you are a vessel of mercy, and God the Spirit has
humbled you in your own eyes, you want nothing but these divine
blessings to bring your soul into communion with God's dear Son.
It is with these he has communion, with those who need him,
with those who are troubled, harassed, and plagued without him;
and all that you want is God's faithfulness, who will give you your
desire in his own time and way. All that you want is for the Lord
of life and glory to come into your heart with savour; and when
God the Spirit raises up faith in your soul to receive the blessing
in love, this lifts you up to the bosom of Christ himself, and fills
you with joy and peace in believing; and this is what it is to have
fellowship with the Son of God. God has called you for that very
purpose. It is his object in calling you next to his own glory, he
has no other. He has not shown you your sins to condemn you,
and send you to hell; he does not so deal with those he has
called. But he makes you feel sin here, that you may not feel it
hereafter; he makes you seek for mercy here and cry unto him
for pardon, that he may fill your soul out of the fulness of Jesus
and give you communion with him here. That is God's eternal
purpose. He lets you have a little communion here, to be a
foretaste and prelude of eternal communion with him hereafter,
"God is faithful." If he has given you any communion here, he will
give you eternal communion with his dear Son in realms of
endless joy and peace. And for that purpose he takes his people
out of the course of this world, that he may give them a measure
of communion here, and enlarge their souls with full communion
hereafter.
THE CHANNEL OF GOSPEL BLESSINGS

Preached on Lord's Day Evening, June 27, 1841, at Zoar Chapel,

Great Alie Street

"The election hath obtained it, and the rest were blinded."
Romans 11:7

The doctrines of discriminating grace always have been, and to a

certain extent always will be, opposed by the generality of the
professing world. They are so humbling to the pride of man, they
are so exclusive of human merit, they so beat down creature
righteousness, they so cut up all the boasted freedom of the will,
that the great majority of those who profess religion will hate and
resist them. But we should greatly err if we supposed that all who
received them were the children of the living God. We have this
strikingly set forth in the history of Gideon. Gideon was raised up
by the Lord as an instrument to deliver Israel from the hand of
the Midianites; and a large army gathered together under his
banner. But the Lord commanded a solemn proclamation to be
made, that every one "who was fearful and afraid should return,
and depart early from Mount Gilead" (Jud. 7:3). In obedience to
this proclamation, out of this vast number two and twenty
thousand left the camp, forsook the banners of the Lord, and
returned to their own homes: striking emblem, apt illustration of
all who make a nominal profession of religion, and endure not to
the end, but, though "armed, and carrying bows, turn back in the
day of battle," and belong to those of whom the Lord says, "If
any man draw back, my soul shall have no pleasure in him!" But
the army of Gideon was too numerous still. "Not by might, nor by
power, but by my Spirit, saith the Lord of hosts;" and the
assembled multitude were yet so numerous, that had they all
continued under Gideon's banner, it would have taken from the
Lord's glory. The Lord therefore commanded Gideon to try them
by bringing them down to the water and to take notice how this
assembled multitude partook of the flowing stream to which he
led them down. The trial which the Lord gave was this: those that
knelt down, and lapped with their tongues, and those that
partook of the water by taking of it in their hands. Of this
assembled multitude ten thousand lapped with their tongues as a
dog lappeth; and three hundred only satisfied their thirst by
dipping their hands into the stream, and drinking the water out of
the palms of their hands. This seems to be a striking illustration
of the different way in which the truth is received by the mere
nominal professor and the living soul. The one lapped as a dog
lappeth. They threw themselves with their bodies all along upon
the earth amid the mud and mire, and thrust their "unclean lips"
Isa 6:5 into the water, so as to drink it down, without anything
to intervene betwixt their mouth and the stream that flowed at
their feet; and thus lapping as a dog lappeth, they showed that
they were those characters spoken of in Scripture, "without are
dogs" (Rev. 22:15). But there was a small company that bowed
down upon their knees, and partook of the water by using their
hands as a medium to bring it to their lips; doubtless implying the
posture of reverence and godly fear, and the hand of faith
whereby the truth is received in the love of it; showing that they
did not receive the waters of truth in a natural manner, did not
fall headlong in the mud and mire, did not eagerly and greedily
swallow it down as the dog lappeth; but that there was godly fear
in exercise, as well as the intervention of living faith; and that
they did not gulp down at one unintermitted draught enough to
satisfy thirst, but partook of it little by little, at intervals,
receiving only just so much as repeated acts of faith procured
them. Thus in our day there is a vast multitude of those who
profess the name of the Lord, who are bitterly opposed to the
truth as it is in Jesus, who are "fearful and afraid" of the cross;
and as such, if they live and die in their cowardice, will have their
part amongst "the fearful literally 'cowards' and unbelieving,"
who shall be cast into "the lake which burneth with fire and
brimstone" (Rev. 21:8). And yet of those who seem to stand by
the Lord's banner, there is a very large assemblage who receive
the truth, not by the intervention of faith, not by the teaching of
the Holy Ghost in their hearts, but receive it in a carnal manner
into their judgment, without the feeling application and spiritual
revelation of it to their souls. "The election hath obtained it, and
the rest were blinded." Solemn words! It should indeed be a
matter of heart inquiry, whether those of us who profess to fear
the name of the Lord are included in this small remnant; whether
we really belong to that "election" which "hath obtained it." For if
we do not belong to that number whom God hath chosen in Christ
before all worlds, we shall die in our sins, and be thrust down into
that fearful place where hope never enters. It is therefore a
matter of solemn inquiry with one that fears God, who knows
what it is to have divine realities commended to his conscience,
who stands at times on the brink of eternity—it is with such a
matter of deep inquiry, of earnest questioning, of anxious
thought, whether he has a well-grounded scriptural evidence that
he belongs to that happy number whom God hath chosen in
Christ before all worlds; and there will be many anxious
struggles, many fervent wrestlings, many vehement cries, before
it is powerfully and sweetly ratified in the court of conscience,
that we belong to that "number which no man can number;" that
we have an interest in the blood and love of the Redeemer.

The apostle had been speaking in the preceding chapters

concerning righteousness. For this is his grand topic in the epistle
to the Romans—the way in which a sinner is accounted righteous
before God. He draws a sketch of the difference betwixt those
who were really accounted righteous in God's sight, and those
who were seeking to obtain righteousness by the works of the
law; and he shows that those who sought righteousness by the
works of the law, stumbled at that stumbling-stone, that they
obtained not that which they sought, and that the Gentiles who
sought not after righteousness, had obtained righteousness. Nor
does he leave it there, but traces it all up to the sovereignty of
God, "in having mercy on whom he will have mercy," and "having
compassion on whom he will have compassion." And when one
replies in a fit of passionate rebellion, "Why doth he yet find fault,
for who hath resisted his will?" he meets him in a moment with
this appeal to his conscience, "Nay, but, O man, who art thou
that repliest against God? Shall the thing formed say to him that
formed it, why hast thou made me thus?"
We will, then, with God's blessing, endeavour to show what the
election hath obtained; and how the rest are blinded. By the word
"election" here, the apostle means, not the choice of God, but
those who are the objects of that choice. It is a Hebrew idiom,
substantives being often used in that language instead of
adjectives; for instance, "We are the true circumcision," instead
of those that are truly circumcised. So again, "The mountain of
my holiness," instead of, "My holy mountain." The writers of the
New Testament were Jews by birth, and often use Hebrew idioms,
though they wrote in Greek. Thus, when the apostle speaks of the
"election" having "obtained it," he means, not that the choice of
God had obtained it, but that the chosen vessels of mercy, the
objects, the favoured objects of that election had obtained it; and
thus the word "election" here means simply the elect. The elect,
then, have obtained certain blessings, and they are the only
persons who have obtained them. Let us see what these blessings
are, and how they obtain them.

1. The grand point which the apostle speaks of here is, that they
have obtained righteousness. This must always be a matter of
anxious inquiry with a convinced sinner, how he can be righteous
before God; because wherever sin is opened up in a man, and
laid as a burden upon his conscience, the effect will be a
discovery of unrighteousness, and a deep conviction working with
power in his soul, that unless he can stand righteous before God,
he never can enter into the abode of him who is perfect
righteousness and complete purity. The "election," then, "hath
obtained righteousness," that is, through the imputation of
Christ's obedience, they stand righteous and accepted before
God, "without spot or blemish, or any such thing;" the garment of
the Redeemer's obedience covering them and shrouding them
from the eye of God, so that he beholds not iniquity in Jacob, nor
perverseness in Israel (Num. 23:21). This all the elect have
obtained, freely given to them by their God and Father in the Son
of his love. But the word "obtained" seems also to point to some
personal reception of it. It is one thing to be righteous before God
in his eyes; it is another thing to have received the manifestation
of this righteousness in our conscience. Now, however true and
glorious the doctrine is, that all the elect of God stand righteous
in Christ's righteousness, the living soul can never be satisfied
with the doctrine in the letter, nor can he ever rest until he has
the manifestation and discovery of it with power to his heart by
the Holy Ghost. And here is that eternal line which separates the
living from the dead; here is that narrow, narrow path which
distinguishes the heaven-born children from those who are
wrapped up in a nominal profession, that the living family must
have power, whilst others are satisfied with form, that the living
family must have heavenly teaching, whilst those that are dead in
sin can be contented with seeing truth In the Scriptures, without
a feeling application of it with dew and savour to their hearts. All
the living family, then, are brought into a state, wherein they are
made to need righteousness. The Lord opened his ministry with,
"Blessed are they which do hunger and thirst after
righteousness." The holy law of God, applied with power to their
consciences, discovers to them what sin is, and slays them as
having personally transgressed his righteous commandments.
When the Lord has thus slaughtered them in their consciences, he
raises up in their souls a hungering and a thirsting after
righteousness; he pours out upon them a Spirit of grace and of
supplications; he opens up to their understanding that there is a
righteousness stored up in Christ; he casts a light upon the
Scriptures of truth, and shows to them that there is no way of
justification but that by Christ. And setting before their eyes this
glorious object, he kindles, by his secret work upon their hearts,
longings, desires, hungerings, thirstings, and breathings after the
manifestation of this righteousness. No man ever got a feeling
enjoyment of Christ's righteousness imputed to him, who has not
passed under solemn convictions of his guilt before God; and if
ever you got at Christ's righteousness without travelling in the
path of condemnation, be assured that you have never arrived
where you are by the Spirit's teaching. How deep these
convictions shall be, or how long these convictions shall last, the
Scripture does not tell us, nor do I deem it possible to set up a
standard to measure them by; but they shall be so deep as to
empty a man completely of all his own righteousness, and they
shall last so long as to strip him of everything in which he can
boast, and to which ho can look with satisfaction.

2 Again the elect have obtained pardon of their sins. For God
will pardon all those whom he reserves. "The blood of Jesus
Christ cleanseth from all sin." "He hath put away sin by the
sacrifice of himself." "In him we have redemption through his
blood, the forgiveness of sins." This is the grand doctrine of the
Scriptures; to this all the types bear witness; of this all the
prophecies are full; the enjoyment of this is that which
constitutes a foretaste of eternal bliss. All the living family then
will be brought, before they close their eyes in death, to a sweet
manifestation of the pardon of their sins. If a man lives and dies
without a discovery to his soul of the blotting out of his iniquities,
he will never enter into the presence of God after death. But in
order to obtain a manifestation of this pardon, we must travel in
that path which God has traced out in the Scriptures of truth. The
blood of Jesus is not to be approached with presumptuous hands.
His blessed sacrifice and propitiation is not to be looked upon with
the eyes of the flesh. He will have in his sanctuary no intruding
worshippers; the veil shall be over the Holy of Holies, and none
but "a priest unto God" shall ever enter "by the new and living
way, through the veil, that is to say, his flesh," to look at the ark
of the covenant, sprinkled with atoning blood. Before the soul can
know anything by a divine revelation of the pardon of its sins, it
must have the fear of God implanted from above, whereby it
approaches him with holy reverence and trembling apprehension
of the wrath to come. The conscience must be made tender and
alive, so as to feel the weight and evil of transgression; sin must
be opened up in its awful colours, discovered in its guilt, and laid
upon the soul as a heavy burden; and if a man has not travelled
in that path he has never yet arrived at that secret sanctuary
where God manifests himself in the face of Jesus Christ, nor has
he ever looked with anointed eyes upon the mercy-seat, and the
Shechinah, the divine cloud that rests upon it. This is the grand
struggle, the painful conflict which exercises so many of the
quickened family of God "Has the Lord pardoned my sins? Am I
an accepted worshipper? Has the blood of Jesus Christ cleansed
me? Do I stand before God, with all my sins cast into the depths
of the sea?" This will be a point of solemn inquiry, anxious
meditation, midnight wrestling, and a pouring out of the soul, at
times, in vehement cries, that the Lord would reveal it, and apply
it, and manifest it, by his own Spirit with power to the
conscience. Where pardon of sin is manifested, the conscience is
purged "How much more shall the blood of Christ, who offered
himself without spot to God, purge your conscience from dead
works to serve the living God." Try yourselves by that test. Say
you, "I have no doubt my sins are pardoned?" Look in the mirror
of God's word. Have the fruits followed? Have the effects that
God has pointed out been visible? Was conscience ever purged,
that is, was all guilt taken away? Were you able to come before
God, without guilt, without condemnation without slavish fear,
without a sensation of his wrath? That is the test, to try whether
the pardon of sin has been felt in your soul, whether your
conscience was purified from guilt, filth, and fear, and you could
come before God without any spot of guilt upon you, whether you
were able to draw near with the feelings of a son and felt the
Spirit of adoption enabling you to cry, "Abba, Father." But, says
some living soul, "I cannot come there; it would seem
presumption in me to say 'Abba Father.' I have not felt what you
have been speaking of, the pardon of my sins. When I come
before God, I have guilt on my conscience; I often fear I shall be
cast into eternal perdition; if I were to die tonight, I could not say
that I should be sure to go to glory, and see Christ as he is."
Well, it is better to be there than resting in a presumptuous
confidence. You had better be in spiritual bondage than in carnal
liberty. You had better be under the rod of God's law in your
conscience, suffering under the sensation of his anger, and
knowing experimentally the meaning of those words, "When thou
with rebukes dost correct man for iniquity, thou makest his
beauty to consume away like a moth" (Ps. 39:11); you had better
be under the distressing feelings of guilt and bondage and wrath
in your conscience, than sitting at ease in Zion, flattering yourself
in false liberty, and believing that you are a pardoned, accepted
child, when the Holy Ghost bears not his witness with your spirit
that you are born of God.
3. Love is another blessing which the election have obtained; the
love of Christ which passeth knowledge, that love which hath
lengths and breadths and depths and heights, and yet such
lengths, breadths, depths, and heights as pass all creature
measure. The "election" hath obtained love; it is the free gift of
God to them,—for he has loved them everlastingly; and a
measure of this love be sheds abroad in the heart of every child
of his, sooner or later. As the apostle speaks, "The love of God is
shed abroad in our hearts by the Holy Ghost which is given unto
us." Have you ever felt the love of God in your souls? If you have
felt it shed abroad there, I will tell you what it has done for you.
It has made your soul burn with love to him in return; it has
drawn forth the affections of your heart to embrace Jesus as your
"all in all;" it has deadened the world, and all that the world can
offer, in your estimation; and it has made you earnestly long to
be with Christ, that you may bathe in his love, see him as he is,
and enjoy him for ever. But say some, "You are setting up a
standard that I cannot reach. It is true, that at times, I have felt
what I have thought to have been something like love to Christ; I
do think that his name has been to me at seasons like the
ointment poured forth. I can say from my heart, honestly in the
sight of God, that there have been moments when Christ has
been precious to my soul! but to speak of the love of God being
shed abroad in my heart by the Holy Ghost, that is a standard
which I cannot reach." If you have received but a drop of love, it
came from the heavenly fountain; if you have had but a passing
visit from Jesus, it is a testimony that you are redeemed by his
blood; if his name has ever been to you as "ointment poured
forth," it was the blessed Spirit who shed that fragrance abroad;
and if ever, for a few fleeting moments, he has been
experimentally precious to your soul, he is everlastingly yours,
and you are everlastingly his. But I will put another question to
you. "How are you when you have not the manifestation of his
love? Can you be satisfied without it? Is it all the same to you
whether you have a visitation of Christ to your soul or not? Are
you as happy on the day that you receive it not, as on the day
that you receive it? Can you be really at peace and rest in your
soul without some testimony of it?" Then, if you say, "Yes, I can
be as happy the day I receive it not, as the day I receive it; it is
all one with me whether Christ manifests himself, or whether he
does not manifest himself; I should be happy and cheerful
without Christ, just as much as with him;" if you say that, you
prove that the love of Christ was never really dropped into your
heart by the Holy Spirit's manifestation; for if that love had been
really shed abroad and made known to your soul by the Holy
Spirit, there would be at seasons a restlessness, a dissatisfaction,
in its absence; there would be an anxious sigh, a groaning
inquiry, an earnest cry, and at times, as the Spirit works it, a
fervent wrestling, that that love should a be revealed to your
heart again. But there may be some who say, "I cannot get even
so far as a taste or a sip; I do not know whether I have ever
tasted the love of Christ which passeth knowledge; nor can I
positively say that I have really felt Christ precious to my soul;
but this I feel, my deep need of him, that I am a ruined wretch
without him, that he must be my salvation or I shall utterly
perish, and that without him there is nothing that I can do
acceptable in God's sight." I will put to you a question also: It is
easy enough to say all this, it is easy enough to use the words,
but what the Lord looks at is the heart. If you are in this state
spiritually, there will be, at times, in your soul, earnest sighs and
cries and panting desires to know Jesus. You cannot rest upon
want, poverty, and destitution as evidences, and say, "I have
heard it described from the pulpit that all the people of God are
not in the enjoyment of gospel liberty, do not walk in the light of
God's countenance, and that many of them, if not most, have
doubts and fears and disquietudes; therefore, as I have all these
evidences, pardon and love will all come in good time; I can take
my rest, I need not be so very anxious nor troubled." These are
plague-spots, marks of death, not the spot of God's children.
Where the conscience is really touched by God's finger, and
brought into the searching light of his countenance, there will be
the pouring out, at times, of the will unto God! that he would
manifest himself; there will be the anxious inquiry whether the
heart is right before him; and a restless dissatisfaction with
everything short of the manifestation of Christ, and the
enjoyment of his blood and love.

4. They have obtained also deliverance; deliverance from the

wrath to come, deliverance from the present evil world, and from
every evil word and work so as to bring them into eternal
condemnation. As a testimony of this, they from time to time
receive deliverances from God; and no man has a real heart-felt
persuasion that he is interested in the deliverance from the wrath
to come, who has not received, and does not receive some
deliverances now. Every deliverance in time is an earnest of a
deliverance for eternity; and if we have never received any
deliverance from God, our soul must hang in doubt, and there
must be room for earnest inquiry whether we are interested in
the deliverance from eternal wrath. Now there are deliverances
which are short of a full deliverance into gospel light and liberty;
there are testimonies which leave the soul short of "peace in
believing," and the enjoyment of that "perfect love which casteth
out fear." For instance, there are deliverances from temptation by
the removal of the temptation; by power being given to resist it;
by its edge being abated; by our being enabled to confess the
sins that press upon our conscience, and by confession finding
relief. So, also, there is at times dropped into the soul some
sweetness out of Christ, which yet does not amount to a full
deliverance from the temptation under which we may happen to
labour. Says some soul, "I think I can come in here; I have had
some deliverances; have found some manifest answers to prayer;
I have been in great straits, and cried to the Lord, and the Lord
has delivered me; I have passed through severe exercises, and in
those exercises I have, for a few moments, or for a short season,
felt the Lord's light and power; I have had tokens that he has
heard my feeble cries." Well, these are deliverances, and if you
have had but one deliverance, one answer to prayer, one
testimony from the mouth of God, one soft word spoken to your
soul, it is an earnest of your deliverance in Christ from eternal
perdition.
These, then, are some of the blessings which the elect obtain; but
God has prescribed a certain channel through which they shall
obtain them. Jesus himself obtained salvation for his people
through suffering. He did not come into the world as a mighty
conqueror carrying all before him, accomplishing the salvation of
his people without a sigh or a groan or a tear, without much
anguish of body, and without much tribulation of soul; but he was
a sufferer every moment of his existence upon earth, and he
wrought out the salvation of his dear people through the medium
of most poignant suffering. The "election," then, has obtained
God's blessings; but, though these mercies are freely given by
God, though they are irreversibly granted for "the gifts and
calling of God are without repentance" upon his part, though
they are freely given, yet the Lord has appointed a certain
channel through which they flow. The channel is not the cause of
them. None would mistake the course of a stream for its origin
and source, and yet the river must flow in a certain channel, or it
would cease to flow at all. So the Lord has appointed a certain
channel for his blessings to flow in; this channel is not the
procuring cause of the blessings, but it is the mode in which the
Lord bestows those blessings upon his elect. For instance, the
Lord, usually speaking, does not communicate blessings to his
people, except through the channel of sighs and cries and groans
and wrestlings with him for the blessing. It is true that, in the
first communications of grace, those find it who seek it not, for
did the communication of grace to our souls depend upon our
seeking it, none of the elect would receive it at all. "I am found of
them that sought me not." But the Lord has appointed that his
people, when quickened by his Spirit, should seek the blessings
he means to bestow: "For all these things," he says, "will I, be
inquired of by the house of Israel." "With supplications will I lead
them." The Lord, then, has appointed prayer and supplication as
a means through which he is pleased to communicate these
blessings. Thus it is not a matter of freewill on our parts whether
we will pray or not; nor is it a matter of duty, but it is a matter of
divine teaching. We pray because the Lord himself kindles in our
hearts the spirit of prayer. The Lord himself puts certain desires
into our souls, pours into our hearts a Spirit of grace and
supplications, and then we freely pour out what the Lord pours in.
The Lord, then, before he communicates his manifested blessings
to is people, works in them for the most part these two
feelings, a necessity of the blessing that they want, and a
hungering and thirsting and panting desire after the
manifestation of that blessing. These two ideas are conveyed by
the comparison of hunger. Hunger is a painful feeling; there is an
absolute necessity connected with it, for if food be not supplied,
the man must die. But connected with this necessity, there is a
longing after food. It is not merely a painful sensation of
emptiness and want; but there is a longing, a desire, an intense
craving after the gratification of that want. Thus this expression,
"hunger," conveys the two feelings that are wrought by the Spirit
in living souls. They are brought to a feeling of want and
destitution, a sense of emptiness and sinking, unless the
blessings are communicated to them. But there is something
more than the necessity. Together with the want, there is a
craving to enjoy food. And out of the working together of these
combined feelings, there springs a fervent wrestling with the
Lord, that he would communicate, and manifest, and bestow his
pardon upon the soul. But the children of God may have a long
season of spiritual hunger and spiritual thirst before their desires
are fully satisfied. The "election" hath obtained righteousness,
everlasting righteousness in Christ; but the Lord has appointed
that his people should obtain the manifestation of it through deep
want and through fervent intercession. So that, though the
blessing is theirs already in the mind of God; though they stand
righteous and accepted in Christ before all worlds; though they
are freely justified from all things, yet the manifestation of it, the
enjoyment of it, the rich experimental revelation of it, they may
be, and often are, destitute of for weeks and months and years.
Yea, many of God's pilgrims go toiling on through life, and the
desired blessing is communicated only a little time before their
souls are taken into the eternal enjoyment of it. The Lord sees fit
that his people shall be kept humble; he will not suffer them to
be deeply entangled in that awful sin of presumption, that is so
rife; and, therefore, he sees good that many of his family shall,
by painful exercises, be kept in a state of bondage, darkness, and
unbelief; and they shall no more be able to deliver their souls out
of guilt and condemnation than they would be to create a new
sun. But all for wise purposes, that they may be kept back from
presumptuous sins, that they may taste somewhat of the
wormwood and the gall, that they may be baptized with that
baptism with which the Lord himself was baptized, and drink of
the cup that he drank of; and thus, when righteousness is
revealed and salvation manifested, they learn what it really is,
and what a power and blessedness there is in it. Many of the
Lord's people go on for weeks and months and years without a
clear manifestation of the pardon of their sins; and sometimes,
when death stares them in the face, or when the wrath of God
against sin is deeply felt, or when things in providence takes a
frowning turn, or when their souls are exercised with powerful
temptations, they are cast well nigh into despair, and fear lest the
blessing should never be communicated to their hearts. These
very exercises, under the Spirit's teaching, work in them so as to
make them dissatisfied with everything short of a manifestation.
The guilt that they feel brings them to this spot, that pardon must
be "something known and felt," that it must be an enjoyed
manifestation from God himself, that there is a divine reality in it;
and that nothing but the discovery of it with power can really
bring their souls into happiness and peace. They could not learn
this lesson in any other way; they could not value it. The Lord
never bestows his gifts upon unthankful hearts. He prepares and
exercises the souls of his children that, when the blessing comes,
they shall prize it; shall estimate it, in some measure, at its due
worth; and shall thank, bless, and praise God for his goodness to
them, the very chief of sinners, and the basest of all wretches. So
with respect to the love of God; he will teach all his people to
sigh and cry and groan and plead and wrestle vehemently for the
manifestation of his love to their souls; they know that it is a
reality; not mere lip-language, not an unknown something just
casually mentioned in God's word; but that there is a spiritual
enjoyment of it through divine manifestation, and that all the
elect of God have it shed abroad in their hearts before they die.
Short of it, therefore, they cannot rest satisfied; short of it, they
feel themselves destitute of salvation; and, therefore, until the
love of God is experimentally realised and made known by the
Holy Ghost to their souls, they cannot be fully persuaded that
they are interested in that love of Christ which passeth
knowledge. So, with respect to deliverances, the Lord has
appointed a channel for them to come in, and this channel is
temptation. Thus, all the elect are exercised, more or less, by
temptations. From these temptations they seek for deliverance.
And, as the temptation is real, so must the deliverance be real
too. It is one thing to see a porter staggering under a heavy
burden in the street, and another thing to have the burden upon
our own back. We might see the burden taken off, it would
convey no relief to us; but were we in his place, were we
staggering and sinking under the weight, the removal of the
burden would be a sensible relief, and we should know the
moment when we were relieved, and feel there was a hand that
relieved us. So those that are burdened in their consciences with
temptations and exercises, must have relief. To read how David
was relieved, how Paul was relieved, how Peter was relieved,
brings them no comfort; they want it as a personal matter, as a
realised thing, as what is made known in their consciences, and
felt with power in their hearts. The election hath obtained eternal
deliverance in Christ; but when the Lord gives a deliverance in
time, seals a testimony, brings in some timely help which delivers
the soul, it is the sure evidence of its eternal deliverance, and
ratifies and manifests it in the heart.

These, then, are some of the things which the election hath
obtained; and all the elect of God who are quickened into spiritual
life, are in one of these two states; they have either obtained the
manifestation of these things in their consciences, or else they
are travailing after the obtaining of them. God has none of those
in his dear family, who are always at ease, careless and carnal,
and utterly reckless whether he will bless them or not. All of his
quickened children, in their measure, some more, some less,
some to a deeper, others in a more shallow degree, but all of his
quickened family are exercised with the things of eternity: and
those of the quickened elect who have not been brought into the
enjoyment of the things of Christ in their hearts and consciences,
are at times, as the Spirit of the Lord works upon them, earnestly
seeking that they may taste and feel and handle these divine
realities in their soul. Election, then, in eternity, is the source of
every blessing in time: out of it, as out of a root, grow all the
branches of life in the soul. But the way in which the Lord's
people get at election, and taste the sweetness of it as sealed
upon their souls, is, by passing through those straits and severe
exercises, whereby they are brought to this solemn conclusion,
that none but the elect are saved; and that if their names are not
in the book of life, and their personal election is not
experimentally made known, they are lost and ruined for ever.

II. "And the rest were blinded." Solemn words! awful declaration!
Look at this assembled congregation, this large multitude. All
here present are either elect or non-elect. Your names, each of
you, as individuals, were either written in the Lamb's book of life
before all worlds, or were written up to eternal perdition. Now, if
you are a living soul, you will be exercised with this matter, and
you will have a conviction in your conscience, that salvation must
be revealed to you from the mouth of God; and until you get that
sweet testimony in your heart, you can never feel fully persuaded
of your interest in eternal realities.

"And the rest were blinded." What a multitude this

comprehends! Look at God's ancient family, those who live in the
vicinity of this place of worship, who dwell so thickly in streets
and alleys within a circle of half a mile from this chapel—God's
ancient people, the Jews! How blinded they are! We, standing in
their privileges, are grafted as Gentiles into the olive tree; and
they, on account of disobedience, are cut off. What a striking
memorial that "the rest are blinded!" Every Jew that we meet
with in the street is a standing testimony that God had "blinded
their eyes, and hardened their heart" (John 12:40).

But when we come within the pale of the visible church,

especially when we come more immediately to those whom we
know, and with whom we stand in connexion; how many of
these, too, are blinded! Who is so blind as the self-righteous
Pharisee that expects to be saved by his own virtues! Blind he
must indeed be, as the Scriptures speak, "smitten with blindness
of heart (Deut. 28:28), and madness and astonishment." Blind
indeed must he be, to think he can work out a righteousness that
shall satisfy God. But, if it be possible, blinder still are those who
have the form of godliness, whilst they deny the power thereof.
Jude speaks of certain characters as "twice dead," and we might
reasonably say of unsanctified professors, that they are "twice
blind," because they have the eyes of their natural understanding
open to see truth in the letter, but the "veil is still upon their
heart;" they are still blind towards God, blind to the supernatural
manifestation and experimental realisation of the truth as it is in
Jesus. If it were not so, if they were not twice blinded, they would
have such a sight of themselves as would drive them into
madness or despair. If those who are destitute of the fear of God,
and yet have the form of godliness, could see themselves as God
sees them, playing with mere baubles, amusing their vain minds
with speculations, whilst under the wrath of God, under the curse
of his law, doomed to eternal perdition,—if they could only have
one moment's sight of themselves as God sees them, they would
plunge headlong into hell to escape, if it were possible, his
vengeful eye. But they are blinded. They cannot see, they do not
know where they are. Blindness hath come upon them, and they
walking in blindness see not who God is, nor what they are; they
see not their real state before God, nor do they know the things
that God's people are mysteriously led into. And are not some of
you afraid that this is your case? Does not your heart sometimes
quake with fear lest you belong to this "rest;" lest the God of this
world be blinding you; lest you have nothing but a nominal
profession, and lest your conscience be hardened through the
deceitfulness of sin. It is good to have such fears. He who feareth
not, who has no solemn apprehensions, who has no anxious
inquires, who is never exercised with some internal trepidation of
soul, it is much to be feared has never known what it is to have
"the candle of the Lord searching the hidden parts of the belly."
The children of God are often earnestly questioning whether they
belong to this band of nominal professors; and their very anxious
inquiries, their very searchings of heart, their very appeals to God
with fervent importunity, is an evidence that they are not blinded.
Those that are blinded by the god of this world, have no
acquaintance with what power and feeling and savour and dew
are; they see not these things, they are blind to their reality, they
are dead to their importance; but the living family, who are
brought by God's blessed Spirit into some apprehension of eternal
realities, have eyes to see what power, is, and hearts too, to
desire to feel its manifestation. Nay, it is the very seeing what
reality and power are, which makes them desire to experience
the savour of eternal things in their conscience; and because they
do not feel them as they wish, it makes them often fear that they
are blind altogether. They are thus brought into that state
described, Isa 59:10: "We grope for the wall like the blind, and
we grope as if we had no eyes." It does not say they had no
eyes, but "as if they had no eyes"—that is, they fear that they
are the characters; they seem so to stagger here and there like a
drunken man, and to be at their wit's end, that they are exercised
in their minds whether they are not blind altogether. But the very
inquiry, the very anxious cry, the very groaning desire, the very
fervent supplication to the Lord that he would not let them live
and die without a testimony from himself, that he would lift up
the light of his countenance and the life of his favour—these very
cries are a proof of life. Were you blind, you would not see these
things; were you deaf, you would not spiritually hear these
things; were you dead, you would not feel these things. And
therefore, that which you seem to take as an evidence against
you, is in reality an evidence for you; and the very sensations of
trepidation, anxious inquiry, godly tear, and the crying out before
the Lord that he would search you and try you, and really make
your heart right in his sight—these very things are the symptoms
of life, the evidences of a work of grace upon the heart, and are
the spiritual breathings of the quickened soul, the Lord himself
having communicated these feelings unto it. The blind, hardened,
dead, conscience-seared professor has no anxiety, no holy fear,
no trembling awe, no godly reverence, no solemn searching
before God, whether his heart is right before him; he is shut up in
unbelief; he has no inward trepidation of spirit before God,
because his eyes being blind as to who God is, and to what he is
before him, all is at peace within him. Like the man spoken of in
the parable of the strong man armed, "his goods are at peace;"
the strong man keepeth the palace, and as long as the strong
man keeps possession, he deadens the conscience, hardens the
heart blinds the eyes, and thus represses any conviction that may
seem to start up in the natural mind.

If God, then, has quickened your soul into spiritual life, and you
have ears to hear, I would just put to you two questions before I
conclude. Have you obtained these blessings? Have you obtained
righteousness by a manifestation of Christ's righteousness;
pardon, by the application of Christ's blood; love, by a shedding
abroad of love, deliverance, by a discovery of God's outstretched
hand? My other question is this—if you have not, and let
conscience bear its honest testimony—if you have never
experienced righteousness, pardon, love, and deliverance, is
there a cry in your soul after them? Is there anything like fervent
supplication that God would bestow them? Is there anything of a
groan in the depth of your spirit that the Lord would reveal them?
These are marks of life; and he that has these marks will have
the blessing, because God has quickened him into spiritual life. It
may be long delayed but it will come at last; "it will surely come,
it will not tarry." It may be withheld for wise purposes, and you
may have to travel through many a dark season and many an
anxious hour, but deliverance is sure; it is reserved for you in
Christ, and you are reserved for it, kept by God himself unto
salvation, ready to be delivered in the last time. I cannot speak to
the blind. They have no eyes to see, no ears to hear; no hearts to
feel. I speak to the living; for the living alone can receive the
testimony of God; and "the living, the living he shall praise him."
(Isa. 38:19).